


What The Fuck (working title)

by orphan_account



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-06-26
Updated: 2015-07-06
Packaged: 2018-04-06 06:21:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 27,102
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4211379
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam Surana joins the Grey Wardens to fight the fifth Blight. Chaos ensues. In the middle of it all is a charming and adorable ex-templar who might just destroy Sam before the archdemon does...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Jugular's Adventures In Blood Land

**Author's Note:**

> The first chapters are crap I spewed out onto a keyboard when seriously sleep deprived, but then I started to try, and I don't really know what happened after that. This is the first time I've ever written fanfiction. Be gentle?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I forgot Jowan's name and just kind of went with it.

It was like – Sam reflected in the moments when he was alone in the dark except for the snoring of the other apprentices – like inside every person there was a solid core of strength. Sam’s was made of glass. Sam’s had shattered and the pieces were still lodged inside him and most of the time they were alright but sometimes something nudged them, cut into him again, reopened the old wounds with more pain and thickened the layers of scar tissue. There was a cruel irony in it, in that was supposed to be his strength only kept hurting him.

If he didn’t move it didn’t hurt so much. You could do that. You could go into yourself and make everything that was _you_ just stop existing, and watch from inside as your legs moved your body, and your mouth said things that you didn’t bother thinking about. Sam moved his hands and made fire, but there was no heat in it.

There was no heat anywhere. The sun didn’t reach into most of the tower. Sam found nooks and crannies where the only light was the candle in his hands, and he would blow it out, and in the darkness he could be anywhere. The musk of old books and the chatter of apprentices and the ever-constant whiffs of smoke and candlewax were not so easily escaped though. There was no escape.

He’d tried. Everyone tried once. He’d asked to go the bathroom and slipped out a side door. He’d scurried into the nearby woods; the breath ragged in his throat and the thorns in his robe the most real sensation he’d ever felt. A reminder that he was alive. They found him within the hour.

There were punishments of some kind. He’d drifted through them. He’d half listened to the stories of the famed Anders, who was some kind of legend, whispered of behind hands. _Did you hear he got almost as far as Denerim?_ The stories all ended the same way. Sam didn’t need hope. There was no hope. The bruises on his arms from where the Templars had dragged him out of a bush were evidence enough, along with the ache in his legs from all the running. He still slept in the same bed that night. This was his fate. _You’re giving up,_ whispered a voice in the back of his head, but Sam was good at ignoring that voice.

When he opened his eyes after his Harrowing, Sam wasn’t sure if the feeling in his chest was relief or disappointment. Jowan was hovering, like he always did. There was something he wanted to talk about, but not _now._ Oh, get lost.

Jowan dismissed, Sam drifted into the head mage’s office.

“Congratulations! Here’s a shitty pendant.”

“Is this it? What a piece of shit.” Sam would have expected the last piece of this elaborate jail cell to be a little less roadside stall quality.

“Don’t be RUDE, Samuel,” the Head Enchanter huffed huffily. “We have a guest.”

It was some human. He had a beard. Just some basic-ass shem, Sam decided.

“Show him to his room,” First Enchanter said boringly.

“What a fucking waste of my precious full-blown mage time,” Sam spat. “Do you not have any servants in this circle? Or should I say, square? Because you’re all fucking squares.”

Best Enchanter gasped and his moustache receded in offense. “Show some respect!”

 _What are you going to do, make me Tranquil? Cos you can’t, now that I’ve done your Harrowing bullshit. Sucker._ “Whatever. Come this way then, you dumbass shem.”

He shot over his shoulder as he left,

“My name isn’t Samuel, you know.”  
They went to the dude’s quarters. The guy didn’t change from his boring amiable expression the whole time.

“Thank you,” he said boringly.

“Yeah, bye.” Sam went off to find Jowan or Jarrow or whatever that fucking whiny loser’s name was. He got preached at by some girl in the chantry.

“No, I’m not interested in bibles, fuck off.”

She shook her head in that condescending way and smiled in that condescending way. “We don’t have bibles in the Chantry! Do you want to learn the chant of light? Do you have any interest in shoving this shitty Circle’s policies further up your own ass?”

“People like you are the reason I’m an atheist.”

She smiled in that condescending way. “If you ever change your mind I’ll be right here.”

“Fuck off.” Sam went to find Jarown. He was in a room. Turns out the annoying church girl was his girlfriend. They were the perfect complements of whiny and annoying. Cute.

Jawarn made that sad face. “Saaaaaaam, you haaaaaave to help me.”

Sam considered saying the words “Fuck off.” He felt that there was a limit to saying that per day, or else it would become stale and clichéd, so instead he said,

“Why would I do that?”

“They’re going to make me Tranquil!”

            Sam thought about how annoying the way Jawen said “tranquil” was. He also reflected upon how they couldn’t make _him_ Tranquil now, because of the harrowing. Sam supposed that was okay. Without any emotions, how could he be sure of the sickness of the burns he was dishing?

            “They think he’s a blood mage! You know, one of the mages who use blood in their magic to do blood magic!” Jiwan’s girlfriend said in that condescending way.

“Are you?” Sam asked. That would be useful. That might be something to capitalise upon, should Jowen ever feel like the Circle was in need of serious chaos.

“NO way!” Jo-wang sputtered. He was clearly lying. Sam found a twisted shred of humour inside himself. There was potential here.

“What are we going to do, then?”

They outlined the plan. It was a crappy piece of shit made of piece of shit ideas, but this was Joewin so you couldn’t expect too much. Sam had to go bribe some useless Head-but-not-actually-head-head Enchanter to get them a fire staff. He beat up some spiders, who honestly had it coming. He pretended they were related to the First Enchanter and Sam was causing personal bereavement to him by killing them. To stop himself getting bored on the way back to Jawon’s sure-to-be-lame conversation, Sam stole from the various chests other idiot mages left lying around in the open. He also bumped into the weirdly amicable shem who was incapable of navigating a simple hallway without a guide.

“Hello! I bet you’re wondering who I am. We didn’t get a chance to talk earlier.”

“I don’t care,” Sam admitted freely. Duncan (that was his name, as he couldn’t resist mentioning) then went on to say some boring shit about Grey Wardens or something. Sam was bored.

“Okay, bye.”

He went back to Joowan and his condescending girlfriend.

“It’s heist time!” Sam announced. Jow didn’t seem very excited. Sam felt annoyed for having wasted his words like that.

They went to the basement and tried to break in. Jorwan’s plan was as shitty as expected and they couldn’t get in.

“Son of a bitch,” said Chantry condescendingly.

“Let’s go around,” Juwn decided. Thinking of all that walking, Sam disagreed.

“Yer a moron, Joe!” he announced.

“Let’s go, team,” declared Jokan regardless, and they went.

“You’ve got to be Jokean me,” Sam muttered, but he followed, because this entire tower was shit, so what did it matter what specific shit he was experiencing?

Anyway, they found a room full of fancy shit and smashed some of it into a wall to break that wall down, breaking the expensive shit in the process.  
“Fuckers,” thought Sam, and he made sure to knock a few more trinkets off the shelf before proceeding into the next room.

The next room contained so much blood that a vampire would be excited. No-one there was a vampire, though, so they didn’t get that excited. Jordan smashed a vial of it. Sam was surprised he didn’t use it for some fucked up blood magic ritual, but that was supposed to be a secret right now, pending a big reveal in the future. So it made sense that Joseph didn’t.

After Jillian had finished his weird blood kink shit, the gang went back upstairs.

“Uh oh,” said Junder as they exited the basement doors. They had been ambushed. There was the Big Enchanter, some other boring mages and some shitty Templars.

“Oh dear,” Jack’s girlfriend said condescendingly.

“You have been BETRAYED,” Big Magics said, pointing at Sam. Sam smiled smugly and thumped himself on the chest. That’s right, he was a tattletale! He’d told the Great Enchanter about Jeffrey’s plot. It had seemed so boring to go along with the shit plan blindly. They were bound to get caught. Might as well be on the right side when it happened. As an additional bonus, Sam and the Primary Enchanter were best buddies now. They were so tight everyone in the room was glaring at them.

“How could you?” asked Chantry girl condescendingly. Jogging made a panicked face and pulled a knife from within his robes, slashing it across his own wrist.

“!” Sam thought, before he remembered Juggling’s awful lies. So this was the famed blood magic. Jowing knocked everyone to the floor and beat a hasty retreat out the door before they could react. Basically it was like every orgy Sam had ever taken part in.

“Oh no!” Best Magician gasped, like he was surprised. He and Sam were tight now, so Sam tried not to think badly of him, but really? What had he expected? He had known that Jesus was a blood mage, but he still let him get away. Not good enough, frankly. If Sam had had a chance he would have turned in his notice as Best Magician’s friend right there and then. At least he could now officially call himself the intelligent one.

Sam didn’t remember a lot of what came next but then there was a conversation where the Great Magic decided to send condescending ex-girlfriend away to some commune. She cried condescendingly when told this. Sam waved goodbye condescendingly as she was led away.

For some reason, Duncan was there. He was arguing about what they were going to do to Sam.

“Excuse me, don’t I get a voice?” Sam queried while they debated the various benefits of his shining but problematic personality.

“Okay,” said Duncan, looking at Sam, “You can join me and the Grey Wardens and kill shit and be a hero and all or you can stay here and be trod on for the rest of your life. Your choice, bro.”

“Well,” Sam said, and the glass shards inside him seemed to retreat a little to their original location, “I guess I’m coming with you.”

 

 


	2. I Can't Stop Alistaring at You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> whoops

The ride to wherever they were going – the Grey Warden base, or whatever – was very uneventful. So eventful that if this were a game, the game would skip straight over it to the bit where Duncan and Sam arrive at Grey Warden Central. Suffice to say, there was a lot of mud. Sam had never been less clean, or soggier, or had so much substrate on the inside of his clothing. His hair was knotted into yellow rat’s tails. He would cast some magic on it to keep it clean, but without a mirror he couldn’t be sure of how good it would look. It would probably be horizontal on one side. Duncan didn’t seem like the type to say anything, but the doubt would gnaw at Sam from the inside out. To remove any uncertainty, he left it to the mercy of this country’s awful weather.

The smell of horseshit and twigs from sleeping on the ground he could do something about, though. He smelled like roses and Duncan smelt like three weeks of stale sweat and wet dog when they rolled up to the big white ruins which were apparently their destination.

“These are the ruins of Ostagar. This is where we will face off against the darkspawn.”

“Okay.” Sam felt that he had passed the point where he could reasonably ask what darkspawn were without sounding like an idiot. He could blunder his way through a booby-trapped labyrinth without a scratch though, so he kept his silence.

There was the King. King Cailan, who had long goldilocks and a grin like a canyon.

“Hello! I am the King! We’re gonna destroy these darkspawn. Darkspawn, more like darksPWND!” he said, without any paraphrasing.

“If you’re such a good king, get me a sandwich. Aren’t you supposed to be for the people? All I’ve eaten for the past three weeks is some shitty squirrels and grass.”

“Don’t be _rude,_ ” Duncan whispered to Sam. This had been the favourite saying of most of the people in Sam’s life for most of his life. Sam ignored it as much as he always had.

Cailan seemed to find blunt insult hilarious. He guffawed an annoying guffaw and got yelled at by his adviser for wasting time.

“Go talk to your uncle,” the advisor said. Cailan rolled his eyes.

“Yes, _mum_.” (It’s funny because it’s exploiting typical gender roles.)

Cailan buffooned off to annoy his uncle with his buffoonery. Duncan shook his head.

“Do you think he’s an idiot too?” Sam wondered. Duncan seemed far too amiable for such an extreme and radical opinion.

Duncan shook his head some more. “I think he is underestimating the threat posed by these darkspawn.”

“Ah yes…the darkspawn…threat…” Sam nodded in a knowledgable way, like the Great Enchanter did every time he spoke.

“Mmm. Anyway, you need to find this guy Alistair. He’ll tell you some shit or something.”

“Okay…” Sam said. Duncan wandered off without giving any more information, like what the fuck this Alistair character looked like or where to find his information-bearing ass.

Sam made his way into the camp. There was a sick dog. Sam patted it but it didn’t get any better. This broke Sam’s heart a little.

“If you find this flower in the Wilds, bring it to me so maybe we can save him,” the dog’s owner told Sam.

“Sign me the fuck up.”

It was only when Sam resumed wandering the campsite when it occurred to him that a place called “The Wilds” was probably not the most welcoming place for someone who valued the way his skin was one compact unit that covered his entire body.

There was a woman named Wynne. She was hanging out with some Circle mages and a few of the obligatory Templars. Sam had seen her around before. The conversation was basically hi, bye and a little filler in between. Sam made some rude hand signals and fart noises at the Templars until they chased him off, swearing. They didn’t lay a hand on him. Sam felt a flutter in his chest, a hint of real happiness in the grin that stretched across his face. They could never touch him again. He laid plans to cast shrinking spells on all their helmets that night. They couldn’t touch him.

It was only by chance that he bumped into the man he had been looking at. There was a guy was making fun of a mage.

“I think I’m going to name one of my children after you… _the grumpy one!_ ”

 _Fucking brutal,_ Sam thought. The mage scurried off and the guy turned to him.

“You know, one good thing about the blight is how it brings people together.”

Sam understood the meaning of the phrase “love at first sight”. It was like the sun had come out. It was like every bad love cliché stuffed into one sentence. He had beautiful blond hair swept back in a wave from his forehead with a few hairs artfully and gorgeously out of place. His eyes were made of sunshine. His voice made Sam want to strip off all his clothes and sink to his knees in awe at this beauty. Those vowels, that pronunciation…. fuck.

“Arg,” said Sam. “I know exactly what you mean.” Sam didn’t know what a blight was, but he wasn’t going to let that stop him.

“Wait…we haven’t met, have we? I don’t suppose you happen to be another mage.”

 _Rude._ “Would that make your day worse?”

The guy said something witty and dorky that made Sam swoon. Then he introduced himself as Alistair. He was also an ex-Templar. That should have made Sam a bit leery of pursuing this, but unfortunately not.

“Yeah, Duncan told me to find you. He didn’t say what you looked though. Guess he wanted me to have a pleasant surprise.”

Alistair blushed like a fucking apple. “Oh…really? Oh…”

Sam reflected on the agony of life, and the fact that all the cute men were fucking heterosexual ex-Templars. “Yeah. Anyway. Grey Warden shit. What’s a blight?”

Alistair was kind enough to explain, but Sam lacked the basic understanding of the word “darkspawn”, which unfortunately peppered the explanation and made it absolutely useless.

“Thanks.”

“Let’s go talk to Duncan. Lead on!” Alistair had this endearing puppy-like quality to him that made Sam come up with the tagline “Heterosexuality? More like heterCRAPuality.” Still, tougher conversions had been made. Alistair would see the light. And Sam would see what was under that armour. You know…sexually.

They made their way back to Duncan. There were two other new recruits, Jory and something. One was scared. One thought he was Andraste, but like the humour Andraste – come to save mankind from jokeless oppression or something. Sam didn’t possess enough energy in his body for all the eye-rolling he saw in his future. _Still better than the Circle_ , he reminded himself. Until Duncan announced that they were going into the Wilds, or as Sam had rechristened them, The Worst Place In Thedas And Very Likely To Be Your Last Resting Place.

“Fuck me,” Sam muttered. This would have been the perfect moment for Alistair to reply “Okay,” but the bastard refused to oblige. Bastard. Sam was a little appeased when Duncan announced that Alistair would be accompanying them.

So off they went, into the wilds. The soldier who let them out the gate gave them a somewhat ominous warning about darkspawn. _So…darkspawn are bad? Glad I got that cleared up._

The Wilds were filled with swamps, bugs, bulrushes and dead bodies. The first things they came across were a pack of wolfs. The other three rushed headlong into the fray, yelling and hitting things with their swords. Sam hung back and shot a few spells in their general direction. He hit Jory by accident, or at least Jory thought it was an accident. The second Alistair seemed to be flagging, Sam would hit him with a healing spell. Alistair gave him a confused look once all the wolves had been turned into bloody carpets, since Alistair was absolutely unscathed and Jory and Andraste covered in their own blood and whimpering. There was frost in Jory’s hair. It wasn’t cold. Alistair didn’t say anything.

_You’re welcome, babe._

They continued into the Wilds, the other recruits staying true to form and whining the entire time. There was a campsite with a mangled body on the ground. As they approached, there was an ambush! A gang of ugly goblin shitheads burst out of the bushes, making guttural noises and generally being dicks.

“Darkspawn! Be ready!” Alistair yelled. _Oh, I see,_ Sam thought, along with, _Alistair they are right fucking there, we can all see them, get it together man._

The battle went about the same way as the last. It ended with Alistair absolutely untouched and the other two on the verge of collapse, moaning a lot. Alistair ignored them and went up to the dead body.

It turned out to be a just barely alive soldier. Alistair gave him some bandages and sent him crawling back to camp, but not before the soldier gave them an ominous warning about danger ahead. That was the last straw for Jory, who started threatening to walk out on them.

“Did you not understand what you were signing up for?” Sam sneered, aware of the irony and hypocrisy in this statement, given that he had not known what darkspawn were until thirty seconds ago.

Jory rubbed at his singed eyebrows. “I have a wife! And a child! I have too much to lose to die here!”

All Sam had to lose was his dignity if Jory discovered that Sam had been the one scorching him. He tried to make his mage staff less obvious. Alistair broke the awkward silence.

“Well, I can sense darkspawn, so if there are any nearby, I’ll be able to warn you.”

“Comforting,” muttered Jory. Sam had to agree that the idea of knowing you were going to die thirty seconds before it happened was not exactly the greatest thing he’d ever heard. Alistair set his broad, strong shoulders and Sam forgot what he was thinking about.

“Let’s get moving.”

“Anything you say.”

Alistair gave him another uncomprehending heterosexual look. Sam shrugged in an innocent and equally heterosexual way.

_Hoo boy._

*

Mages weren’t allowed to own things, to exist outside of a context of “dangerous”. They weren’t people; they were threats. They didn’t live; they were managed. Love in the Circle was an oxymoron. There was all that religious preaching about the dangers of sex, but for some of the mages the only rebellion they could manage was heaving and gasping in each other’s arms in a secluded corner. That was all they dared, though. To love something was to give yourself a weakness.

There was the appreciation of someone’s body, a brief period of hand brushes and eye meeting, then a meeting in a dark corner for long enough to get your pleasure, and you never talked to them again. Sam had had a few encounters himself. It was a decent escapism, but like all escapisms there was the inevitable realisation that you had never left. He’d given up. He’d been too deep inside himself to care about some girl who tried to meet his gaze in the library. You didn’t want anything. You didn’t need anything. You didn’t love anything. There was nothing they could do to you.

The fresh air and the itchiness of the mud caked into Sam’s underthings had addled his senses. He didn’t care. The crushing inevitably of an ending was still there, but the sun was shining today. There was an ever-present dread in his chest that something was going to go wrong, and that he was in no way free. But the sun was shining today. Alistair was cute. Sam continued to breathe. He was a free man, for the next second at least. That was something. That was everything.

 

*

The witch twisted her lips into a red smile.

“You,” she said, pointing an accusing finger at Sam, “elves have more sense than humans. What do you have to say?”

Sam looked at his party, at Jory and whatisname cowering in fear, Alistair hung up on how bad swooping was. He shrugged.

“I’m Sam. Do you have the treaties?”

The witch smiled. “I am Morrigan, and no, I do not. My mother does.”

“Can we have them back?”

“You may.”

“Let’s go, then.”

“Wait,” hissed Alistair, glaring at Morrigan, “this could be a trap.”

Something – probably the hot blush in Alistair’s cheeks – told Sam that he had probably never seen a boob before. _Oh, honey._ Sam had to admit that Morrigan’s were rather intimidating for one’s first time. Still…

“If she was going to murder us, she’d have done it already. Let’s go.”

Morrigan smirked. “So practical! You, I like.”

Sam found that he felt the same way. They went to the cottage, where Morrigan’s mother was waiting. She turned out to be an old hag who didn’t at all resemble Morrigan. Suspicious.

“Here are your treaties. Take better care of your shit next time, you idiots.”

Alistair got all blustery and offended at that. Morrigan made some very unsubtle hints that they were now to leave.

“Why don’t you show our guests back to their camp?” Flemeth suggested, her eyes twinkling wickedly.

Morrigan grumbled like a sulky teenager. Sam was feeling more connection to her by the second. They made their way back to the Grey Warden camp in sullen silence. She didn’t stop to say goodbye.

Alistair whistled. “So...Flemeth, huh? The witch of the wilds! Wow!”

“Yeah. Neat.” It was just some old lady; not that impressive. “Let’s go find Duncan.”

Before they stopped off at Duncan for whatever arduousness was coming next, Sam went to visit the sick dog again. He was still sick. The dog owner fed him the flower, but it didn’t seem to make any difference.

“Fuck everything,” muttered Sam, and he sulked off to Duncan.

Alistair was with Duncan, being as hot as ever. The other recruits were there too.

“Drink this shit. There’s a side chance you might die, but it’s chill.”  
Jory had a somewhat understandable breakdown at this. Duncan straight-up murdered him for that. _Now that was fucking cold._

The Andraste of Humour was next. He chugged the blood, had some sort of seizure, and was pronounced dead – all in the space of thirty seconds! Now it was Sam’s turn.

_Not sure if this is a case of third time lucky, or if this trend is going to continue…_

Sam didn’t have much choice. What else could he do? Fight, and be killed? Run, and be hunted as an apostate? He drank the entire thing. _Hope you’re impressed at my ability to fit a load of liquid in my mouth, Alistair_ he reflected, before his body burned like that time an idiot apprentice with absolutely awful aim had hit him with a massive fireball. _Fuck you, Dennis,_ was his last thought before he passed out.

 

*

Sam woke up with a terrible headache. He imagined this was how a hangover felt, although he’d never had alcohol in his life. Fucking Chantry and all that shit. Alistair and Duncan were looking at him in concern.

“How do you feel?”  
“I feel so amazing! I might go for a run, or do three hours of intense combat training! I’ve never felt better in all my life!”

Alistair chuckled and offered him a hand up. (They’d left him passed out on the floor like a drunk?)

“You’ll feel better in a bit.”

 _Wow, Alistair, you should be a therapist._ Sam nursed his aching throat.

“Okay.”

“Right,” said Duncan boringly, “We have a war meeting to attend.”

They went to the meeting. Cailan was there. When you stood him next to Alistair, the resemblance was uncanny. Suspicious. Anyway, Cailan gave Alistair and Sam the boring assignment of lighting some signal flare. _Alone time with Alistair away from the heat of the battle? Perfect._ It seemed like everyone expected Sam to complain, but he accepted it happily. He also noticed that there seemed to be no other Grey Wardens. Where was everyone? This wasn’t exactly a very large or comprehensive war council. Whatever.

“Let’s go, partner,” Sam winked at Alistair, who didn’t seem to catch on that this was flirting as he answered with a perfectly coherent quip of his own.

“Let’s ride! On our imaginary horses, apparently.”

Sam had never said that it was a funny quip.

_This heterosexual is going to kill me._

_  
_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay in the bit where it's like "Sam would see what was under that armour. Y'know....~sexually~" you have to imagine that the word "sexually" is said the same way as in the Key & Peele sketch where the guy is ordering pizza and pretending his action figures are his friends that he's buying for. The pizza guy asks if the girl is hot and he looks at the figure and goes "yeah but she's taken. i've hit that. y'know....sexually." The way he says "sexually" (including the long pause beforehand) is exactly how Sam thinks that sentence. 
> 
> The video is called "Key & Peele: Pizza Order". Please look it up on Youtube. Your understanding of the exact nuance of how Sam inflects that word in his head is vitally important to your enjoyment of this story.


	3. The Village of Loathering

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loghain really is quite a dick, isn't he?

It was the first real big battle Sam had ever been in, and even with no standard against which to judge, he could tell that he was a fucking disaster.

Firstly, there were darkspawn everywhere. Inside the fucking tower Alistair was supposed to reject his heterosexuality inside of! Sam and Alistair and some random guards had to fight their way to the top. It was a little irritating because all the chests in here were locked, and none of them could pick locks. The best part about battles was the loot, honestly. Sam kept hitting Alistair with the healing spells. Eventually he’d realize.

Secondly, there was the fact that once they’d gotten to the top of the tower and lit the signal, everything went to fucking shit. The king’s dick uncle sounded the retreat, and for some reason thousands of soldiers abandoned thousands of others to their deaths. Cailan and Duncan both died messy, unheroic deaths. Was there even such thing as a heroic death? Whatever.

Thirdly, Alistair and Sam were standing at the tower top watching all this carnage for themselves when the room suddenly filled with darkspawn and darkspawn arrows. Several of these hit Sam in the chest.

_This is very sore. Is this a mortal wound? Am I dying? If I am, I wish… I wish…_

It all faded away before Sam could realise what it was he wanted.

 

*

Sam did wake up. A surprise. Sam was getting used to these near-death experiences. He was still unsure if the surviving part was negative or positive.

_Where am I?_

The roof he opened his eyes to was made of roughly cut wood beams. The room smelt of herbs and a little smoke, a smell he recognized from the healing classes he’d dozed through. Sam, suddenly filled with irrational fear that he was back in one of those classes, lifted his head.

“Morrigan?”

It was she. She walked toward him, her hips and boobs swaying like she had been built specifically for the heterosexual male gaze.

“Ah, you’re awake.”

Some part of Sam’s brain registered that people he associated himself with had a flair for stating the obvious. Another part noted that he was dressed only in his underwear.

“Where am I? How did I get here? Where’s Alistair?”

Morrigan explained like every word was a personal affront to her. Sam liked that. She was a strangely likeable person, for all that she exuded hostility.

“Flemeth rescued you two from the tower. She healed you both of your injuries. You are the only Grey Wardens left alive in this country. She only saved you so that you could stop the Blight.”

Sam felt his chest. There were little knots of scabs here and there, like weeks-old wounds, on top of the scars that already were there. _Impressive. Does being old and ugly come with a sudden affinity for ridiculously powerful magic? Because I don’t think I could handle that. I honestly don’t think I’ll ever grow old. Not really…_

“Wait, did you say the stop the Blight? Just the two of us? I’m – what? You’re fucking kidding me.”

Morrigan sighed. “Look, why don’t you go talk to your companion? Please, at least stop his bawling. He is worse than a child.”

“Oh…okay.”

Sam went outside. Flemeth’s house was very small and shitty. The walls looked like they could collapse at the slightest touch. He was glad to see Alistair again.

“Sam! Are you alright?”

“I’m fine.” Sam wanted to clutch Alistair in a big squishy hug. There were tear tracks on his cheeks, and his hair was dishevelled and his eyes red. _No, no, that’s dangerous territory. You stop that._ “What’s going on?”

“You must stop the Blight,” Flemeth interjected.

“Excuse me, we were trying to have a private conversation here,” Sam snapped. Flemeth cough-laughed so hard Sam was afraid she might die. Morrigan didn’t seem to give a fuck. Sam was sensing a pattern here.

“A little thanks would be nice,” Flemeth finally managed to wheeze.

Sam felt the wounds on his chest again.

“Yes…thank you.” It was at this point that he realised he was still wearing only his underwear. No wonder the weird looks Alistair was giving him.

“Oh, fuck me,” he muttered, and scurried back inside to put on his robe. It was still the same apprentice robe he’d worn in the Circle, the same one he’d done his Harrowing in. So much had happened since then. The robe had collected quite a stench as well.

Sam went back outside, where he got the feeling that Morrigan had been laughing at him. Alistair wasn’t. He probably emphasised with this situation, to be honest. Or else he was just really sad.

“Why are you so sad anyway, Alistair?”

Alistair stared at his feet. “Duncan’s dead.”

“But hey! I’m not!”

Apparently that was not very good consolation.

“So...anyway,” Sam cut through the awkwardness. “How do we go about stopping this Blight?”

“You need to kill the Archdemon. For this you’ll need an army.” This was Flemeth.

“What about the treaties? We can use those.”

“Now you’re thinking. Good boy.”

“Are they going now?” Morrigan drawled, hovering pointedly at her mother’s shoulder.

“Yes. And you’re going with them.”

“WHAAAAT?”

This was an amusing conversation to witness. Alistair seemed to revive a little and demanded that Morrigan stay. This was ironic as it was technically taking Morrigan’s side. Sam pointed this out. Alistair looked angry. Sam estimated that his chance of getting into Alistair’s pants had decreased by about 5%. Dammit.

“Let’s go, team!” Sam announced, when everyone was _finally_ finished angsting. Both Alistair and Morrigan shot him glares. Alistair’s was still tear-stained.

 _I’m sorry,_ Sam thought, but he didn’t say it. You don’t say things like that.

 

*

Alistair and Morrigan had amusing conversations. Sam could listen to Alistair bluster for hours, and Morrigan’s sarcastic drawl was the icing on the cute cake.

            Morrigan had decided they should go the village of Lothering first, to pick up supplies. Alistair was very sad the entire way. The walk was uneventful, right up to the point where it became eventful.

            It started with a gentle woofing in the distance. Sam turned around to see where it was coming from, and he was knocked over by a boulder made of fluff.

            “What the heck?” he grumbled, trying to heave the mass of fur off himself. The dog – it was a dog – panted in Sam’s ear and spread slobber all over his face.

            Sam managed to get up and saw that it was the same dog from Ostagar.

            “You got better? Good boy!” Sam hugged as much of the dog as his arms could reach. The dog huffed and slobbered all through his hair. Sam felt a weight in his chest lift.

            “That must be a Mabari. They’re very intelligent.” Alistair said.

            “I love him. He’s coming with us.”

            Morrigan sighed. “Why? We already have Alistair.”

            _Fucking savage, Morrigan,_ Sam reflected, as Alistair got very offended.

            “He is my best friend, and he is staying. His name is Yosemite. He likes cuddles, candlelight dinners and long walks on the beach.” Sam scratched the dog’s belly and kissed him on the nose. Morrigan made a disgusted face. Yosemite grinned doggily.

            Yosemite proved a valuable companion against the snivelling bandits outside Lothering who were tried to take their money. He tore them apart in less than a minute. Sam rubbed his bloody head.

            “Good boy!”

            It turned out the fun with the bandits was only an entrée for the fun to be had in Lothering. The fun started with Alistair and Morrigan arguing as soon as they set foot in the village. Sam wasn’t sure if he should tell her to shut up or give Alistair a big squishy hug. The hug wouldn’t be so great, given that he smelt like a nug. Sam was too small to give squishy hugs anyway. He settled for a reassuring look in Alistair’s direction every time after Morrigan had fucking roasted him.

            The first stop was a merchant who was overcharging on his goods. Sam used his influence to tell the townsfolk to get the fuck over it, which made Morrigan laugh a lot.

            There was a horrifyingly ugly child looking for his mummy. She was probably dead. Sam told him this and he started to cry. _That’s life, kiddo._

            “Go to the Chantry and mention Andraste and cry a bit. They’ll probably give you food.”

            “Fanks, mister!”

            “Yeah, okay.”

            It turned out that there was some kind of bounty out for Grey Wardens, because Loghain claimed they had betrayed him at Ostagar. It was a good lie, really. All good lies have a portion of the truth in them.

            The town was full of refugees from the darkspawn, all begging for help. You couldn’t walk two steps without being assailed with a sob to find a lost locket or rescue some child or set some poison traps or some shit. Sam did help some of them out, because he felt like it was the kind of thing Alistair would approve of. After the twentieth fireball he’d shot at a bandit, though, he was starting to feel a bit tired. The village was very full. Maybe he and Alistair would have to share a bed?

            “Let’s hit the inn.”

            As soon as they stepped inside, they were assaulted by a bunch of soldiers.

            “Fucking Grey Wardens! Kill them!” they yelled, before trying to kill them.

            Alistair, Yosemite and Morrigan made quick work of them, while Sam took a quick breather in a suddenly vacant chair by the fire. His team was helped by a rogue, who had ginger hair and was wearing a Chantry robe. Suspicious? Perhaps. Sam would have taken a nap, but the battle was over too quickly.

            “Fuck off to your shitlord of a Teyrn and tell him that Sam is Lo-going to make him fucking suffer,” Sam told the beaten soldiers. They nodded.

            “Yes ser, sorry ser, we’ll be on our way ser!”

            Off they scurried. The rogue approached them. She had an Orlesian accent. It was both nice and annoying.

            “Ah ‘ope you do not mind that I ‘elped you out back there,” she said. Sam shrugged. The fire would have been just as nice no matter if she was there or not.

            “I had a vision from the Maker about you,” she continued.

            “Oh? Am I as devilishly charming in real life?”  
            She chuckled. “No, that was not what the vision was about. Ah believe that the Maker sent me to help your quest.”  
            “She’s completely insane,” Morrigan said, sounding a little impressed.

            “Will you allow me to come with you?”

            “Um. Why not.” Sam shrugged.

            Morrigan groaned.

            The next thing Sam and friends did was to free a self-confessed murderer. Leliana, the Chantry rogue, pleaded for them to show him mercy.

            “You know he just told us that he murdered an entire family? You heard that, right?” Alistair exclaimed.

            Morrigan shrugged. “I’m sure he’ll make a perfect complement to our religious zealot, foul-smelling mangeball, and the dog.”

            “Hey!” Alistair yelled.

            _You can’t tell me you didn’t see that coming._

            The Qunari in the cage was indifferent to his fate.

            “Either the darkspawn kill me, or I go with you. It makes no difference to me. I seek only repentance.”

            Sam looked at Yosemite for answers. He licked Sam’s fingers and rolled onto his back, tongue lolling. He always knew exactly what to say.

            They got the key from the Chantry and set the Qunari free. He didn’t give any reaction to this turn of events. Leliana was pleased.

            _Well, if I’m murdered in my bed, at least I’ll know the Maker approves of the choices that caused it!_

            Sam decided it was time to get out of this village. The last thing they did was to rescue a dwarf merchant and his enchantingly daft son from some more bandits.

            “Thanks! I’m in your debt!”

            “Show me some coin, then.”

            “Okay… we won’t bother you any more, serah!”

            Suspicious.

            His entourage of misfits nearly doubled in size, Sam left the village of Lothering. Morrigan and Alistair were still arguing.

            “You are incredibly stupid.”

            Alistair sputtered. “I have no idea how to reply to that comment!”

            Classic.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, "enchantingly daft" is a pun. Just in case you didn't notice.


	4. Camping (intents)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Sten's personality is awfully insulted for the sake of a cheap joke.

            Sam slept spooning Yosemite. He usually woke up with a dead arm and Yosemite’s slobber all through his hair, but he loved it. It was comforting to have something big, fluffy and warm to cling to, to have it by his side when he woke up and thought for a second that he was back in the tower. But there was that shitty outdoor smell, and the reek of dog, and the gentle snoring of the Mabari that was nearly as big as he was. He felt protected. It was a novel feeling.

They were travelling to Bann Teagan’s estate, to see if they could get his support against the darkspawn and Teyrn Loghaine. Sam used the time on the road to get to know his new companions.

 Alistair had entire conversations with Yosemite.

Alistair was a bastard who was raised by flying dogs, so this made sense.

Alistair missed Duncan.

Alistair had never licked a lamp post in the winter. Sam wasn’t sure what this was a euphemism for.

Alistair told jokes instead of talking about his feelings.

Alistair was unbearably sweet.

Sam wished he could sleep with Yosemite on one side and Alistair on the other.

Sam was losing hope of this.

Sam talked to Morrigan. She was not at all sweet. She was straightforward. She was a challenge to talk to and an absolute riot. She didn’t have emotions. Sam wondered what it would be like to sleep curled up next to her. He dropped unsubtle hints. She took them.

“It’s awfully cold in my tent…”

Sam went. He didn’t make a big deal of it; he didn’t want Alistair to see. He remembered that Alistair wouldn’t get jealous, which made up his mind. It was fun. It was as meaningless as every encounter in the dark at the tower. There was no terror hastening their heaving, no mingled excitement and fear in their muffled panting. There was nothing.

“Don’t even mention romance,” Morrigan warned him, after making some remarks about his Grey Warden stamina. Sam didn’t. They talked about if Flemeth was actually an evil old bag, but nothing much came of it.

He liked Morrigan well enough. He just…couldn’t be bothered. He hugged Yosemite and imagined that the smell of Alistair somehow clung to his fur.

It was dangerous, this feeling. The blight could end them everyday. Sam had nightmares about the Circle discovering that Duncan was dead and sending Templars for him. He imagined the shards of glass inside him shattering completely. He imagined what it would be like to never wander through a forest again, to never have the free rein to shoot a fireball at a darkspawn. Speaking of darkspawn…

“Did you dream about the archdemon?” Alistair asked him. Sam nodded. His heart was racing, his feet tangled in blankets feeling like chains.

“It was a dragon.”

“That was the archdemon.”

“Okay.”

“We can sense the hoard, but the hoard can also sense us.”

“Okay…”

“You get used to it. Eventually.”

“What’s an archdemon?” Sam blurted.

Alistair was kind enough to explain.

“There are other side effects too. I had a massive appetite for the first few weeks!”

Sam thought about the meat he had literally stolen off Yosemite’s plate and inconspicuously fireball’d to perfection last night. Yosemite had whined and stared with those big sad eyes and Sam felt bad, so they shared it.

“Ha, me too.”

Sam was a spectacular conversationalist.

Then there was Leliana, who opened the conversation by asking about the alienage.

“Was it very terrible?”

“I don’t remember.”

“Oh, of course! You’re a mage. You must be from the Tower of Magi. What was that like?”

“Very terrible.”

“Oh, ah am sorry. Should ah not have brought it up?”

“No, it’s…fine…” Sam shuddered. “It’s great.”

“Shall we talk about something else? In Orlais, you would be in high demand. Everyone loves elvish servants there. They are so attractive.”

“Oh, I wasn’t aware that I was an animal. Am I a magical bunny? Are you going to pull me out of a hat so that I can perform some tricks for humans?” Sam suddenly had a headache.

Leliana’s face fell and she held out her hands helplessly. “I am so sorry…I didn’t mean to offend you. I must stop babbling!”

Sam grimaced. “I suggest you…babble about something else. Not related to who or what I am at a fundamental level.”

“Shall I tell you about my vision?”

“Fuck no.”

Sam felt guilt at saying that to her, but whatever. He lay down in his tent and cuddled Yosemite.

“You’re the only one who understands.”

Yosemite _woof_ ’d softly in response.

Leliana tried again the next evening, after a horrifically rainy day, which happened to be the same day they were ambushed by about fifty darkspawn. Sam was soaked, filthy and aching. He stared blankly into space while Alistair waved a bowl of stew underneath his nose.

“What?”

“Dinner.”

“Okay.”

He became aware that Leliana was sitting next to him. He shovelled stew into his mouth, ignoring the temperature.

“Thank you for healing me today,” she said. Sam, after a moment, dredged up a memory of a bleeding Leliana praying to the Maker for forgiveness, surrounded by the corpses of darkspawn and gushing blood down the arm she held up to tumultuous sky. It wasn’t an image one forgot, really. It was the main reason Sam could barely lift his feet at the moment. Morrigan, of course, didn’t know any healing spells. Of course it was all up to Sam, who only knew two. He had to cast each about ten times before he was certain she wasn’t going to die. He hadn’t paid much attention to spirit magic in the tower. His aching body and blank mind hated him for it.

“Okay,” Sam mumbled, after a long moment where his mind agonisingly recalled the fact that Leliana had said something. It wasn’t really okay. He couldn’t form the syllables or string together the thoughts to express this.

Leliana stared at her hands. “I’m sorry for what I said last night. And now I’ve made you exhaust yourself for me…I understand if you hate me.”

Sam was sure hatred was a far too complex emotion for him to process at the moment. “Mmm.” He stared at the bowl of soup, suddenly incapable of lifting it to his mouth. Yosemite whined and placed his head on Sam’s knee.

“I…”

The bowl slipped out of his hands. Leliana’s hand darted out and grabbed it before it could hit the ground. Sam felt himself start to sway.

“Ughh…”

“Come on. Let’s get you to bed.” Sam felt a strong hand slide around his shoulders and heft him up, followed by another from the other side.

_Alistair…?_

“Come on then, sleepy pants.”

_Yeah, Alistair…_

He was conscious of dropping and then he was lying upon a soft blanket. His eyes were long since closed. A hand pulled the blanket over him. There was a thud and familiar warmth of Yosemite next to him.

“Mmmph…”

He was asleep before he could even put his arms around his dog.

 

*

Sam did have a conversation with Leliana eventually. She was far too skilled to have been a Chantry sister. Leliana was spectacularly evasive about it. Impressive really.

“You do not believe in the Maker at all? Do you really think that all this could have been an accident?”

Sam shrugged. “The Maker believes people like me should spend their lives treated like criminals purely for being born with magic.”

“The Maker doesn’t believe that!”

“The Templars think he does. And they’re the ones with the swords.”

Leliana fell silent for a while.

“The Maker does not want anyone to suffer in his name,” she said at last.

Sam stared at her. “Well, he’s not doing a very good job of preventing it, is he?”

Leliana must have seen something in his eyes, because she didn’t mention the topic of Sam’s religious affiliations again.

And then there was Sten, who was not privy to the idea that you could use more than five syllables in a sentence. He had conversations with Yosemite too.

“Growl.”

“You are a noble beast.”

Sam decided to play a game.

“Where are we?”

“Ferelden.”

“Do you want to talk to me?”

“No.”

“Is the sky green?”

“No.”

“Are you human?”

“No.”

“Am I a human?”

“No.”

“Do you have horns?”

“No.”

“Do I have horns?”

“No.”

“Are you going to tell me anything about yourself?”

“No.”

“Is grass blue?”

“No.”

“Is water red?’

“No.”

“Does the sun set in the north?”

“No.”

“Are Qunari all like you?”

“No.”

“Is Yosemite a girl?”

“No.”

“Do you want some cheese?”

“No.”

“Is Alistair’s name Sten?”

“No.”

“Is Leliana Fereldan?”

“No.”

“Is Morrigan an elf?”

“No.”

“Is my name Sten?”

“No.”

“Is Morrigan’s name Sten?”

“No.”

“Is the dog called Sten?”

“No.”

“Is your name Sten?”

“Yes.”

Sten didn’t want to talk about himself. Sam wasn’t all that curious, so whatever.

One night they were all sitting around the fire eating some kind of grey stew when they heard a rustling coming from the bushes.

“Darkspawn?” Leliana asked, as everyone jumped to their feet. Sam shook his head. Leliana crept around the side to ambush while Alistair drew his sword.

“Come out of there, you – bush-creeper!”

Sam found himself smiling. The rustling increased in intensity and there was a strangled squawk.

“No, no, don’t hurt me serah! It’s just me, Bodahn.” The dwarf they’d met on the road tumbled out of the bush, along with his dazed son Sandal. Sandal is outside the realm of jokes. Bodahn bumbled his way into staying with him, and let them buy his goods.

“Given that we’re offering you free shelter and protection, you’d think we’d get a bit more of a discount than this. Or, you know, get it for free.”

Bodahn looked flustered. “Meser, we’re doing our best.”

Sam dumped down a ruined leather tunic a darkspawn had shredded into useless strips.

“Give me a refund.”

“But meser, what am I supposed to do with this now?”

“Give me the fucking money.”

Bodahn trembled. “Okay, okay…”

At least Sandal enchanted things for free.

Morrigan still insisted that she didn’t know any healing spells. Alistair, dear bumbling Alistair, seemed to hurt himself every second day. Rarely from the darkspawn – it would be ordinary, stupid things like burning himself on the cooking pot or breaking his thumb because the ground was very hard and he was trying to hit the tent peg with a hammer but he missed. He would come up to Sam during a quiet moment when nobody else was listening, and present his injury shamefully. It was the same face Yosemite made when Sam discovered he’d lain down in his clean clothes and made them all muddy.

“Would you like me to kiss it better?” Sam asked, straightfaced. Alistair laughed.

“Yes, o great healer, please make it better with the magical healing power of smooches!”

_This boy has no idea what he’s saying._

Sam took Alistair’s hand or foot or whatever and gently felt for the place where Alistair yelped in pain. He cast a few healing spells to knit flesh and reduce pain … he cast every healing spell he knew, all both of them. It seemed to work, anyway. Alistair didn’t complain about any of the injuries again. If it was a big wound, like a broken bone, Sam’s head spun afterwards for a while. He didn’t let Alistair see this. He didn’t want to deprive himself of the chance to gently run his fingers all over his fellow warden’s hands, every scar and every callus. He did it quickly and subtly, and it wasn’t enough. He wanted the hands he was touching to curl around his own.

 _Boy, you got it bad._ There was no denying it. He was utterly fucked.

Finally, they got to Redcliffe. Alistair stopped Sam on the cliffs just before they entered the town itself.

“There’s something I need to tell you…”

“Yeah?”

“You know how I’m a bastard?”

“Parents or personality?”

Alistair laughed. Sam smiled a little.

“Parentwise,” Alistair said. “Well… I’m actually a royal bastard. The old king was my father. Bann Teagan didn’t want people to know, so he just raised me as a.…regular bastard, I guess.”

Sam remembered the suspiciousness of Alistair’s resemblance to King Cailan. “I see. A regular bastard.”

“Duncan knew, which is why he gave me the assignment to the tower, to keep me out of danger. He could never just treat me as a regular recruit.”

“You could have told me this earlier, you know.”

“Yes, I know… but then there was the blight and I don’t know, it just never seemed like a good time! I was going to but it just…never came up.”

Sam shrugged. “It’s okay.”

“Really?”

Sam grinned. “Yeah. Lead on, your majesty.”

Alistair groaned.

“I am going to regret this...”

And with that, they entered Redcliffe.

 

 


	5. "I Know What I'm Doing."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Redcliffe is not very RADcliffe.

“Now we threaten priests! What fun!”

Sam gritted his teeth and avoided meeting Leliana’s eyes. Morrigan was smirking. The revered mother was glaring at him. There was a lot of fire in her frail old body.

“Look,” Sam said. “They’d feel better if you gave them something. Even just some stupid piece of string that’s been blessed by Andraste or some shit. Do you not care about this village at all?”

“I am not going to lie,” the mother snapped. “Now please leave my chantry.”

“Fuck you too,” Sam said, and he stalked off.

The preparations for fighting the super spooky scary demons coming to murder them all in their beds tonight were not going well. Sam had accidentally murdered some villagers who were hiding in their house, because trying to bully them into joining the fight had only resulted in them attacking him. The blacksmith was drunk off his face. Sam had kicked his door down and made some bullshit promise about getting his daughter back, just to make the man shut up and work his bloody forge. Now the priestess was too high and mighty to see any kind of sense and just give the soldiers something to make them believe that Andraste was guiding them. He’d yelled at her. Morrigan kept making smart comments. Sam wanted to shout at her too.

There was a crying woman hovering at the chantry doors. She sniffed and straightened when she saw him coming.

“Sorry to bother you, messer, but…”

“What the hell’s wrong now?” Sam saw her flinch, shrink before his eyes. A part of him registered that this was not the best thing to be saying, but it was buried deep today. Today Sam was made of shards of razor glass.

“It’s my brother, I…I can’t find him…”

Sam groaned. The girl pulled herself in tighter and turned towards the wall.

“I’m sorry! I won’t bother you anymore!”

Sam shoved his hands in his pockets, grabbed the top of his legs, willed them not to walk away. _Haven’t you already been enough of a dick today?_

Those glass shards twisted viciously inside him. _Haven’t you done enough for these whiny shits?_

“I’ll find him,” he forced through clenched teeth. The girl smiled and cried a bit.

“Bless you! I last saw him in our house. I’m so worri -“

“Yeah.” Sam walked out. He saw Alistair and Leliana over joking with some of the children. Sten and Yosemite were watching the soliders practice with unreadable expressions. Morrigan was nowhere to be seen, probably off witching somewhere. Sam didn’t want to talk to any of them. He ducked around the side of the courtyard and into a side street, where he found the house the girl had mentioned. He tried the handle and slipped inside.

There was a quiet sob coming from the wardrobe in the bedroom.

“Get out or I’m kicking the door down.”

A snotty brat tumbled out and gazed sorrowfully up at Sam.

“I’m sorry mister, I just wanted to be brave.”

“You were crying in a cupboard.” Sam said. The boy winced.

“I don’t want to go back to the chantry! Everyone’s so scared there!”

“You’re scaring your sister. Get out of here.” Sam scowled at him. The boy sniffed and nodded.

“Yes mister! I’m sorry mister!” He ran off.

Sam looked at the wardrobe the boy had been hiding in and contemplated climbing into it himself. It had been something he’d done a lot at the Circle. Hide in a cupboard, pretend in the dark that it was somewhere else. Avoid doing any chores. But Sam wouldn’t fit in it, anyway. He sat on the floor and stared into space.

He wasn’t sure why he felt so upset today. It wasn’t that he was particularly worried about the results of tonight’s battle. The people here at Redcliffe weren’t soldiers. Sam and his merry band of misfits could get through this, somehow. No, Sam was worried because he hadn’t realised what being a Grey Warden meant.

Everyone looked at him for answers, opinions, help. Grey Wardens were synonymous with leadership, it seemed. Now that there were only two of them left, they had to embody all the ideals of the Grey Wardens. Two wardens to save the entirety of Ferelden. Sam had only met two Grey Wardens. He had no idea what he was doing. Alistair was helpful to an extent, but he was, by his own confession, no leader.

_Neither am I!_

Sam, for one horrifying second, wished himself back at the tower. The glass shards tore at him. At the tower, there had been a kind of awful simplicity. There had been no responsibilities, no requirements besides “Sit still and let us imprison you”. It gave you no preparation for what the real world would be like. It wasn’t meant to. You weren’t meant to ever see it, anyway.

But now?

“I have no idea what I’m doing!” Sam yelled, and the bed caught fire. He quashed the flames with a quick winter’s blast. The room filled with a reek of burnt, wet straw. Sam stared at his hands.

_If only I could fix everything by shooting spells at it._

*

Night had fallen. The sky was stained orange by the glow of the fire traps. It was burning oil that Sam had found in the ransacked ruins of the general store.

“They’re coming!” someone yelled. An army of dead people piled out of the castle and hurtled down the path towards them. Sam swallowed and shuffled a little further behind Sten.

_That is…that is a lot of monsters…_

“Fear is not a good example to lead by,” Sten rumbled. Sam ignored him, tried to think of a good comeback, and then the army was upon them.

Sam spent most of the battle trying to prevent his party dying from all the injuries they suffered by walking right through the bloody fire traps. Lots of healing, then. Sam leaned on his staff and kept casting. He was glad the dead people were mostly ignoring him. He was too busy putting out the fire his companions set on themselves to notice them much anyway.

Finally they got rid of all the monsters at the top. Sam was feeling better than he expected. All the darkspawn battles they’d fought along the way seemed to have increased his endurance for casting spells. Too much healing still set a heavy weight in his bones, though.

A messenger ran up the hill towards them.

“They’re attacking the town! Come now!”

 _Of course they are. Why the fuck would it be over when the fun’s just getting started?_ Sam stumbled off after his companions, swearing.

The last battle was long. Sam camped out with his lyrium potions on a balcony and shot spells at corpses, healed his friends when they started to flag. Morrigan turned into a sick spider and wreaked absolute havoc. Sam was very jealous. All he could do were some fireballs, ice and nature punches. Oh, and of course his two shitty healing spells. He used those a lot. Lyrium didn’t really help as much with the weariness from them.

At last, with the glow of sunrise threatening on the horizon, the village fell silent. They looked around for more monsters.

“We did it,” Sam murmured. “Ugh.”

He tried to stand and walk down to where the rest of his party were gathered, looking tired but relatively unhurt. Thanks to Sam. Sam got up off the balcony railing he had been kneeling by and his head swam.

“Well, shit,” he said, right before he fainted.

 

*

“I’ve never met a mage who faints as much you do,” Morrigan commented when Sam opened his eyes. They were in the Chantry. Someone had carried him to a bed here and his friends were loosely gathered around him. Yosemite licked his face.

“You clearly haven’t met very many mages. Anyway, when someone keeps running right into the traps we set for the enemy, it’s a bit unavoidable.” Sam looked around for Alistair to glare at in particular and discovered that he was not there.

“Where is his imperial majesty?”

“I was talking to Bann Teagan,” Alistair said, appearing suddenly like an intensely handsome poltergeist. Sam would have swooned if he wasn’t already worn out from all the swooning he’d done that night.

“He wants to say a few words to the villagers.”

“A few wor – wait, what time is it?” Sam sat up and realised that the chantry was actually well-lit because of sunlight, not candles. It was a lot emptier than yesterday as well.

“It’s mid morning. We didn’t want to wake you up…”

Sam felt a part of his dignity wither and die. He’d been lying here like a sick child while they’d all been…doing stuff? Pathetic. He rolled out of bed and stood up, screwing up his face against the dizziness that welled up in his head when he did this.

“I’m fine now. Let’s go talk to Teagan.”

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Leliana asked, looking worried. Sam was _pretty_ sure he wasn’t swaying.

“I’m fine. Come on.”

They went outside, where Bann Teagan hailed them as heroes and talked about the bravery of the men they’d lost. Sam smiled and nodded. The sun was blindingly bright, reflecting off the water.

After the talk, Teagan took them up to the windmill and told them of the new plan to sneak into the castle and see what kind of fresh hell was occurring up there. He was interrupted in this speech by Arl Eamon’s wife, Isolde, who had an Orlesian accent with the force of a hurricane.

“Who ees thees?” she ahsked.

“I’m Sam.”

“Ah don’t really care. Teagahn, you must come with me to the cahstle.”

Teagan frowned. “Just me?”

“Yes, Teagahn, now.”

Sam rolled his eyes. “This doesn’t sound at all suspicious.”

Teagan went anyway, and nodded at Sam to go ahead with the plan as Isolde led him to what was probably his imminent death.

“You’re a bit thick,” Sam muttered. “Anyway.”

They found the trapdoor in the windmill and snuck into the castle’s dungeons. There was a whole bunch of corpses there who attacked them, but they weren’t really much of a problem. Sam was feeling less like he was about to pass out any given moment, since he had taken about ten lyrium potions before they left. It was easy to shoot fireballs and ice, anyway. It was only healing that made him feel like a trampled rag doll.

They had cleared out the dungeons of corpses when Sam heard a familiar whiny voice coming from one of the cells.

“Oh, you have got to be kidding me,” Sam muttered.

It was indeed Jowan, looking more morose than ever.

“Well,” Sam said, staring at him. “What are you doing here?”

“I was hired to teach the arl’s son magic. And…I poisoned the arl as well.”

“Are you responsible for the army of drooling corpses?”

“No!” Joseph yelped.

“So… you came here to teach the arl’s son magic, poison the arl, but when some zombies show up it’s suddenly not your fault?”

“No!” Jowan’s eyes bulged.

“Why were you poisoning the arl?”

“Loghain told me to do it.”

Alistair groaned. “Of course!”

Sam sighed. “So why are there walking corpses everywhere?”

“I don’t know! I was locked up here before they started showing up.”

An idea came to Sam. “Is it possible the kid’s been possessed by a demon? I mean, he doesn’t know anything about magic, less since you tried to teach him.”

Jowan looked unhappy. “I don’t know! Maybe?”

“Right. Okay.”

Sam wasn’t sure what to do with this information. Now they had a fucking demon to fight on top of everything else. He paced back and forth, putting on a thoughtful face. The others were waiting for him to do something. _What the hell am I supposed to do?_

“I understand if you want to kill me now,” Jowan said tentatively. “It’s only fair, after all I’ve done.”

“Well, that’s nice, because that’s exactly what I plan to do.”

Leliana gasped. “No! You can’t!”

Sten grumbled as well. “Is it not hypocritical to kill this man after you showed me mercy?”

“Guys –“ Sam started to say, but Alistair interjected.

“He’s a blood mage! It’s too dangerous to let him live.”

 _Well…I mean, it’s Jowan so it’s not_ that _dangerous…_

“Does that still mean he deserves to die? He wants to make it right!” Leliana insisted.

“He can’t! He’s a bloo-“

Sam held up his hands to curb the argument that had started.

“Please. None of you had to listen to him talk for fifteen years of your life. I know what I’m doing.”

“I’m so sorry,” Jowan whispered. Sam stabbed him and he gasped, shuddered and died.

“That was unnecessary,” Leliana said. Sam didn’t reply. The knife dropped from his fingers and clattered on the floor next to Jowan's body. His eyes were still open, glassy with shock and guilt. Sam looked away.

“Let’s go.”

They fought their way through the rest of the castle. The blacksmith’s daughter was hiding in one of the rooms. Sam told her to get lost back the way they’d come. She scurried off.

They went to the throne room, where Connor was fucking shit up and being creepy as hell. Isolde got him to revert to his original self and run away upstairs. Teagan stopped being creepy and cackling all the time.

“Okay, we have to kill that demon,” Sam said. He’d decided to get in ahead and make his decision before anyone dropped the responsibility onto his unwilling shoulders. Was that how leadership worked? Dammed if he knew.

Isolde gasped. “We can’t! He is still my son.”

Sam frowned. “He’s possessed… by a _demon._ There’s not much choice.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be against the oppression of mages?” Leliana asked quietly.

“He’s possessed! We can’t do anything!” Sam glared at her. “It’s not oppression, it’s a worse case scenario! There is _nothing_ we can do.”

“Surely we can,” Isolde insisted.

Sam sighed and looked at Morrigan.

“If we had a group of mages, they could send one of us into the fade to battle the demon there without harming the child,” she suggested. Sam suddenly felt like an idiot. An idiot and a child.

“Oh.”

The implications of this sunk in. Back to the tower? What fresh kind of bullshit… of course, the treaties meant they would have to return there anyway, but this felt like begging. Ugh.

“Let’s go to the tower then,” Alistair insisted. “We can save an innocent life here.”

Sam threw his arms up in the air. “Fine! Let’s go talk to the big powerful mages! We’ll be back soon! Teagan, Isolde, try not to die in the interim.”

“Hurry back,” they urged.

Sam set his jaw. _You can bet I’m not spending a second longer in that tower than I have to._

He was conscious of Alistair and Leliana angry with him for suggesting he kill the kid. _I’m no good at this. Why the hell am I making all the decisions around here, anyway? They always seem to hate me, whatever I choose. Can’t someone like…like….can’t someone else step in? I have no idea what I’m doing._

Sam didn’t say any of this. They set off on the road again. The waters of Lake Calanhad glimmered like oil in the sunlight as they rode along its shores. The glass inside Sam was grating at him with every step his horse took. He felt a coldness settle inside his belly. The tower loomed in the distance, a needle, a sword. Sam stared at the sun, hoping his gaze would drag it down below the horizon faster. Hide the tower from view. Make them stop, pitch tents, crawl into bed and curl up and bury his face in Yosemite’s fur. Sam’s entire body felt like it was made of stone. He could see his companions felt the same way, in the weight their shoulders held as they slumped in their saddles. He realised he didn’t know if they’d gotten any sleep at all and felt an immense rush of guilt.

“Let’s make camp,” he said, leading his pony into a copse of bushes. There were no complaints. They went through the motions of pitching tents, cooking, eating. No-one stayed around the campfire to talk. Sam crawled with a feeling of intense relief into his blankets. He clutched at Yosemite, who blew a huff of wet air in his face.

“I love you, boy.”

He shut his eyes and waited for sleep. His body was aching all over. He waited. He kept seeing Jowan’s face.

_He was annoying! And he poisoned the arl, and he was a blood mage, and he was…he was…he escaped from the tower and then I killed him…_

Yosemite whined and placed a paw on Sam’s chest. Sam hadn’t realised he was shaking.

“We’re going back to the tower,” Sam muttered. “Oh Maker, I’m going back.” He felt a tightness in his chest, pulling all the glass in together, cutting new paths for it. He winced.

Yosemite whined again and licked his face.

Sam drew a deep shuddering breath. “At least I won’t be alone,” he whispered into the empty darkness. “At least… at least you’ll be there.”

He knotted his fingers in the fur on the back of Yosemite’s neck. He knotted and clenched so tight it must have hurt the mabari, but Yosemite didn’t pull away.

“At least…I’m not really going back. I’m a grey warden now. They can’t have me …they can’t…”

The words sounded hollow. Sam clenched his other hand, felt the fingernails dig into his skin. Yosemite laid his head on Sam’s chest. Sam could see the faint glimmer of light in his eyes but that was all.

 _At least I have you…._ Sam thought, and he whispered it into the cold blackness. Yosemite huffed softly in response. Sam suddenly felt cold and very small. He was shrinking, compressing. The tightness in his chest made the glass shards shift, cut into him. He stretched out his arm into the darkness and imagined another hand taking it, caressing his fingers, pressing lips to it. Those same lips murmuring in his ear, gentle, loving words….

Sam felt a hot tear squeeze out of his eye and he dashed it away, his body taut and trembling.

“I’ll be alright,” he whispered into the vast coldness of the night, but the words were very small and the tent was very empty. They were swallowed up.

 _I wish,_ Sam thought, and he bled with the wanting, _I wish someone would say those words back to me._

Yosemite huffed softly. Sam felt the shards twist and slice. Another tear, hot and traitorous, burned down his cheek.

“I wish you weren’t just a stupid dog.”

Yosemite whined and licked his nose. Sam felt the shards stop moving. Yosemite licked his hands and his face and his neck and every bit of exposed skin. Sam felt himself relax little by little, and then he was asleep.

He woke up to sunshine and birds and Yosemite’s awful breath. He still ached and he imagined he could feel the weight of his empty words in the air above him.

“Breakfast,” Alistair called.

Yosemite pulled at Sam’s covers.

“Yeah, alright alright alright,” Sam grumbled, and he got up. He tried to match Alistair’s smile, felt the sides of his mouth move but saw that Alistair was unconvinced. He didn’t say much. He didn’t say much for the weeks it took to get to the tower. His head felt like a tombstone.

There it was, right across the lake. It had disappeared for a while when they’d gone up towards the northern end, but now the tower loomed like a monolith. Sam took a deep shuddering breath, disturbing the glass a little.

“Off we go, then.”

_Maker preserve us._


	6. Tower of Mag-die

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I don't know how to spell malificar and at this point I'm afraid to ask.

There was the tower. They went inside and discovered chaos. Templars were scurrying around the entrance hall, looking haggard and panicky and not stopping to ask their business. Injured Templars slumped against the walls, nursing their wounds. Sam spied Knight Commander Greigor and wound his way towards him. Every step he took felt like a step towards a gallows. _They have no power over you._

“What’s going on here?”

The Templar commander stared at him. “Who are you?”

Sam gasped, personally affronted. “I am a Grey Warden! I used to be a mage here. Don’t you remember me?”

Sam thought back on all the Templars he had sassed and smiled a little. The commander seemed to remember that as well, as his face darkened.

“Oh. Yes. What do you want? We’re not exactly taking visitors at the moment.”

 _Have you ever?_ “What happened here?”

The commander sighed. “The tower’s been overrun by maleficarum. No-one can go inside. I’ve sent for the rite of annulment.”

“The rite of annulment? What?” Sam felt all the blood drain from his face. _Remember, they can’t get you…_ “What if there are still innocent mages alive in there?”

“We can’t take that risk.”

 “Why not go in and try to save them instead of slaughtering every mage! Why not protect mages like you’re supposed to, instead of murdering them!”  
“You haven’t been in there!” the commander hissed. “It’s too dangerous. There won’t be any survivors. They’ll all be abominations by now.”

“You don’t know that.”

The commander shook his head. “None of my men are going in there until the Rite of Annulment gets here.”

Sam felt rage welling up inside him. “I’m not one of your men. I’m going.”

Morrigan shook her head. “Why not just leave them to their fate? They chose to be enslaved by the Circle, ‘tis only what they deserve.”

“Shut the fuck up, Morrigan,” Sam snapped. “These Templars are not going to murder anyone more than they already have.”

“We’re barring the doors behind you,” the commander warned. “I’m not letting you out unless the First Enchanter himself tells me that the tower is safe again.”

“He will, with me standing beside him covered in the blood of every Templar who tries attack me in there.” Sam retorted. The commander looked directly at him, with eyes made of stone.

“Very well. But if the Rite arrives while you are still in there, I will enact it. I will not allow any more of my men to fall at the hands of malificarum.”

The blood surged and burned in Sam’s veins. He met the commander’s icy gaze with a glare that shot fire. There was no fear in him, only a fierce, twitching rage that tautened every muscle in his body. He spoke his words slowly, directly, each word falling off his tongue like a boulder.

“And I will not allow the Templars to slaughter any more of my kind.”

They remained glaring at each for a moment that stretched on and on, taut as a violin string. Sam felt his eyes watering and refused to blink. Refused to break first. He wished he were taller, so he could get a bit of a head start on the whole intimidating thing. _  
_

Finally, the commander looked away.

“Let them in,” he said, signalling almost boredly with his hand at one of his men.

The doors slammed behind them with a clang that resonated in every fibre of Sam’s body. He winced.  _It's not forever. Kill the abominations and you'll be out again. Kill them before the templars kill you..._ _  
_

“Come on.”

There was little to see at first. The apprentice dorms were a mess, chests open with clothes spilling onto the floor, a few beds overturned. There was a diary of some kind, a scuffed and worn locket. The only memories of home. Sam imagined the apprentices rushing to grab what mattered most, supplies for a few days, banging on the doors and yelling, screaming, to be let out. They were nowhere to be seen now. Sam felt a sense of foreboding settle in his stomach like a stone. It was absolutely silent. His footsteps echoed too much, every little noise setting his skin crawling. He shuddered.

“Where is everyone?” Alistair wondered. Sam shook his head.

“I don’t know.”

They continued further in. Sam’s skin was prickling with gooseflesh. He held his staff in both hands, twisting in his fingers, hard enough he might wear indents in the wood. They rounded a corner and Sam saw movement out of the corner of his eye. He yelled, coiled a fireball in his hands and spun it at the disturbance. The flames dissipated against a shimmering wall the person threw up.

“I’m not a maleficar!” the person called. Sam recognized the voice’s owner and let the next fireball sizzle out.

“Wynne?”

She nodded, relief washing her lined face. There were dark bags under her eyes and she limped slightly as she approached. Faces poked out from behind her, apprentices of various ages. Sam recognized most of them. Their faces were pinched, weary.

“I thought all the Grey Wardens died at Ostagar,” Wynne commented.

“Well, not me. Or him,” Sam nodded at Alistair. “We came to enlist the mages’ help against the Blight, but something tells me that isn’t happening any time soon.”

“No, I imagine not. Are the Templars coming? Have they enacted the Rite of Annulment?”

“They’ve sent for it, but it’s not here yet.”

Wynne sighed. “We are doomed, then. I set up a ward beyond here to protect us from the others, but I suppose we are to fall at the hands of the Templars in the end.”

“Not necessarily.” Sam told her what Greigor had said. “If we can clear out the Tower, they won’t need the Rite.”

“What are we waiting for, then? Let’s go. I’ll let the barrier down.”

“Woah, wait a minute! You’re ancient! What if you put out your back or something?”

Wynne chuckled. “There is plenty enough life in me to show a young whippersnapper his place. Come on.”

She went up and placed her hands on the shimmering barrier over the door.

“This won’t take a moment.”

One of the apprentices used that moment to accost Sam about what the cause of this infestation _really_ was.

“Andraste is punishing us!” she hissed, her eyes bulging. She clutched at Sam’s sleeves. “Better we be cleansed in fire than continue to sin.”

“Uhh, do I know you?” Sam asked, trying to tug himself free. Her face fell.

“We were apprentices together! Don’t you remember? You completed your Harrowing, though. I still haven’t. I guess I never will.”

“Okay…” Sam felt as though he knew her face. The juxtaposition of it against the stark grey walls brought back memories of long, dull afternoons in the library. Memories of droning teachers, hovering Templars…Sam shook himself.

“Are you ready to repent to Andraste?” she continued. “Magic is a sin. We brought this fate upon ourselves.”

Wynne called from the doorway and Sam finally yanked himself free.

“Gotta go, bye.”

“Are you ready?” Wynne asked. Sam nodded.

“Let’s go.”

It didn’t immediately get bad. The library was a mess, books everywhere, but not exactly demonic. They rounded a bookshelf and bumped into some possessed Templars. Then there were some lesser demons, and more Templars, and abominations. They just didn’t stop coming. Finally they fought their way to the stairway. Sam assessed his party. They seemed to be doing okay.

“Anyone hurt?” Wynne asked, looking each of them over with a practiced eye. Sam remembered that she was a spirit healer and felt the wondrous realization that he might be able to make it through this battle without fainting, for once. Yosemite licked Sam’s hand and Sam grinned at him. For a second the metallic smell of blood and dusty scent of books both faded away.

“Let’s get moving then,” Wynne announced, after confirming that no-one required healing. She glanced at Sam. “That is, if you’re ready…?”

Sam scratched the top of Yosemite’s head, remembered that he was supposed to be the leader, and suddenly felt deflated. “Uh, yeah. Let’s go. Okay.”

Wynne nodded and strode off up the stairs.

On the next floor, amidst all the lust demons and possessed Templars, they found a mage hiding in a cupboard. He scratched his head at them, looking sheepish.

“Well, I heard demons and screaming, so I decided I’d just get into this cupboard here. And it all went quiet until you came along. If it’s all the same to you, I think I’ll go back in now. Let me know when you’ve killed them all.”

Sam heard the click of the door and felt a small twinge of jealousy. _That was my cupboard once._

They came across some blood mages. They seemed dead, but one last one survived. She begged for forgiveness, cowering on the floor.

“We were just trying to take our lives back. You’ve lived here, you know what it’s like. We just want our freedom,” she said, her eyes wild. The blood dripping down her arms could have belonged to any of the other dead mages scattered around her. She propped herself on one arm, her eyes darting between the party and the door. Wynne’s lip curled.

“You are foolish. There are ways to go about this.”

The mage coughed and spat out a wad of bloody phlegm. “Sometimes there is only one way. Andraste was a rebel before she was a hero.”

Wynne shook her head. “Becoming an abomination will only convince them that all their suspicions about mages were right.”

The blood mage dropped her gaze to the floor. “It’s too late to argue now. Do what you must.”

Wynne looked at Sam. Sam held out his hand. The blood mage frowned at him.

“Just get out of here,” Sam said. “I never want to see you again.”

The mage’s mouth twisted and she took Sam’s hand. Her hand was wet and warm and smeared red onto the cuff of Sam’s robes. He pulled her to her feet and she scurried off into the depths of the tower.

Wynne looked at Sam like he had just burst into her chambers naked and uninvited. “That was a poor decision.”

“She wasn’t an abomination. We’re not Templars, Wynne.”

Wynne shook her head but didn’t say anything more. They continued in silence. Sam was feeling increasingly antsy, uncomfortable, on edge. More than the usual threat of being murdered by malificarum at any given moment kind of upset and unease. They came across flesh mounted on the walls in bulbous, oozing mounds.

“Now that’s just excessive,” Alistair commented. Sam felt he was seeing it from a distance, felt an outside observer watching his body being moved around by an unknown source. His hands clutched at the wood, rubbed, tried to get a splinter in his finger to drag him back to reality. He was tempted to hit himself over the head with it, to see it would drag him back into his body.

“I’m certainly not hiring these guys for interior decorating again,” his mouth said. His finger caught on a splinter on his staff and he teased at it, drove it deeper. There was a sting and a trickle of blood spilled out. Sam felt the ground under his feet again, in time to hear Alistair’s dry chuckle.

They came across the Tranquil who ran the supply closet. Their blank eyes and monotone always made Sam shudder. He had wondered what it would be like to be made Tranquil. He had wondered if it would be better to not understand what you were going through, to know the meaning of the word “prison” but not being able to recognise that you were in one. Some days he had wondered if he’d become Tranquil all by himself, if he was functionally at all different from the zombies who performed the most mindless tasks.

“I decided to stay here and tidy up, because my supplies were in a mess,” the Tranquil supplied in a monotone to Wynne, who was questioning him about what he had seen. Sam had eventually came to the conclusion that he would not be Tranquil. They were creepy, for one. Sam had decided the current of thoughts and emotions lurking beneath the surface, what arguably made a person, was not something he wanted to give up. Even if the current was often a torrent in flood full of boulders, so loud you couldn’t hear yourself if you stood next to it. Climbing into closets and staring at the darkness made it go quiet, somehow. It didn’t have the permanence of tranquillity, but neither did the thoughts. Most of the time Sam was able to tell himself that they weren’t permanent, at least.

The Tranquil having creeped them all out enough, the crew pressed on into the tower. There was a demon in the middle, surrounded by a flesh goop that had a mage encased in it. The demon told them to take a rest.

“I’d rather just kill you now, if it’s all the same to you,” Sam told it. It nodded.

“Of course, of course…but don’t you think you deserve a rest first? You’ve been working so very hard, after all.”

 _I don’t want a rest, thanks. I want to get the hell out of here._ Sam’s eyes grew heavier, the demon flickering in and out of view as he fought to hold them open. He was spinning, falling, slipping.

_Rest…_

“I don’t wan –“

Sam frowned. He couldn’t remember what it was he didn’t want. He shook his head to clear it of the cobwebs. Weird.

Here he was, at Weisshaupt. There was Duncan, the Warden Commander. He beamed amiably at Sam.

“Aren’t you glad that we defeated the Blight?” he asked.

“What kind of a question is that? Of course I am. That was – that was a great triumph.”

“Good, good.”

Sam felt like he was dismissed. He shifted his weight from foot to foot.

“Err, Duncan?”

“Yes, my boy?”

 _I’m not your boy._ “What do we do now?”

“Now we enjoy peace in our time.”

Sam frowned. Duncan was astounding in the scope of his amiability and naivety. “There’s no such thing.”

Duncan laughed. “Of course there is, my dear boy!”

Sam felt a rage bubble up inside himself and grabbed his staff. “I’m not your dear boy!”

Duncan hissed. “Do you really want to do this, boy?”

Sam pointed his staff at him. “Of course I do! Suck my ass, let’s go!”

“Very well.” Duncan spun and suddenly he was a towering lump of lava. Sam gaped.

“Wait, you were a demon all this time? I just thought you were being a dick.”

The demon snarled and lunged at him. Sam stumbled backward, but a few quick frost spells later, the demon was ashes. Sam stared at the ashes and at the surroundings. Now that he thought of it, this particular shade of yellow green was incredibly familiar…

“Ah fuck,” he said out loud. “I’m in the fucking Fade.”

He remembered the sloth demon and the tower and the quest and he groaned. _Guess I’ve gotta go do the rescue thing again. If they ask, I was aware that Duncan was a demon right from the start. Of course he was._

Sam espied a portal in the corner. He touched it and the world went fuzzy and purple in that special Fade way.

_Let’s just get this over with._

 

*

It took hours but finally they all woke up, sprawled in a mess of blood and viscera on the tower floor. Sam stood up and took a moment to check that his body was all there, and that he wasn’t a mouse or a towering floating spirit. The world no longer shimmered when he turned his head, but it was still…this was real, right? Right.

They took the litany of thingamajig and continued onwards.

“So that was the fade,” Alistair said. Sam nodded.

“Yup.”

Scintillating conversation.

They came across another Tranquil, who murmured that none of this would have happened if all had been made Tranquil. Sam wanted to hit him. He clenched his fists into his staff instead.

 

*

There was the new Templar, Cullen, in a magical cage. Sam felt a vindictive happiness wash over him to see the Templar bent over, his head bowed and his spirit broken. He held up his hands in warning as they approached.

“Don’t come any closer! I know what you are. You don’t fool me!”

Sam opened his arms in greeting, beaming. “It’s me! Don’t you recognize me?”

Cullen groaned and sank to his knees, covering his eyes with his hands. “You’re not real! Get away from me!”

Sam crossed his arms and waited, tapping his foot. Cullen peered between his fingers and whimpered.

“You’re…you’re still here?”

“Yup.”

“Why didn’t you go away when I closed my eyes? Get out of my head!”

Wynne stepped forward. “We are real, Cullen.”

Cullen stared at her. “Wynne? You’re…this isn’t an illusion?”

“Nope. Where’s Irving?” Sam butted in. He had seen enough of Cullen’s face to last a lifetime, to be perfectly honest. He’d hoped to never have to see it again.

Cullen gazed at Wynne, but his eyes seemed to go right through her. “The blood mages took him to the top of the tower. I don’t know what they’ve done to him. Those blood mages…they get into your head, they twist your thoughts, they make you _do_ things…”

Sam nodded. “Okay.”

“We must rescue Irving _now!_ ” Wynne said, and she led the stride up the stairs. She was immensely spry for her age.

“Wait!” Cullen called. Sam paused.

“What?”

“If you have find any mages still alive up there, you have to kill them.”

Sam raised his eyebrows. “Do I now?”

He exchanged a glance with Yosemite. “Did you know we’re talking orders from Templars now, boy?”

Yosemite _ruffed_ in agreement.

“Yes!” Cullen insisted. “They could be malificar. You can’t risk letting them survive. It’s too dangerous.”

Wynne shook her head. “We are not slaughtering any innocent mages.”

Cullen fumed. “You must! You don’t understand what the blood mages are like. There is no way they could have continued to resist all this time!”

“We’ll see when we get there, won’t we?” Sam retorted. Wynne nodded, her eyes blazing. Cullen slammed a fist against the walls of his cage.

“No! You have to listen to me!”

Sam grinned and took a step closer. “The way I see it – you’re in there, and I’m out here. So I don’t have to do shit. See ya.”

Cullen yelled and hit the walls some more.

“Dammit, Surana! You’ll get us all killed!”

Sam thumbed his nose at him.

“See you in a bit! We’ll let you out when all this is over...if we remember, that is.”

The intensity of Cullen’s tantrum increased. Sam was still smiling as he fell in beside Wynne.

“That was childish,” she chastened. Sam shrugged.

“Whatever.”

The overwhelming metallic reek of blood warned them that they were getting near to the Harrowing chamber.

“Let’s do this shit,” Sam said.

“Yeah!” his party of Wynne, Alistair and Yosemite chorused.

They burst in the doors to discover murderous abominations. Ughhh.

The abomination tried to seduce Sam with dreams of grandeur. Sam remembered that the exact same thing had happened the last time he was in this chamber, doing his harrowing. He told the demon the same thing he had told the other demon.

“Go fuck yourself.”

The demon got very offended and tried to murder them. Sam and his associates kicked some serious butt. Wynne did all the healing. It was an ordeal, but they were all still standing at the end of it. Sam stared into the eyes of the abomination, now a quivering mass of goop trembling on the floor, and kicked it right in the face. It shuddered and melted away into a heap of viscera.

“Thank the Maker,” Irving murmured. Wynne rushed over to him.

“First Enchanter? Are you all right?”

Irving grimaced. “I’ve been better.”

Alistair and Wynne helped pull him to his feet. Sam hung back. He remembered the look on Irving’s face when he had dragged him up for his Harrowing. There had been no trace of compassion in it, just a sort of resignation. _Irving doesn’t give a fuck about mages, really. Weird, since he is one._

Sam instead helped the other mages to their feet. Some were shaking or stared straight through him. One of them, an elf apprentice who looked younger than Sam was, mumbled that she was fine and toppled down to the ground as soon as Sam let go of her. He knelt down and slipped an arm around her shoulders, tried to help her again. She stared at him, not moving, as limp as a puppet.

“Are you real?” she wondered. She raised a trembling hand and brushed it against his cheeks. Her fingers were cold and bloody. Her eyes unfocused and her hand dropped. Sam saw a slash in the sleeve of her robe and that there was a large gash in her arm, slowly oozing blood. He looked around for Wynne. She was busy with some of the other mages. The girl Sam was holding let out a groan and slumped lower, her eyes falling shut.

“Hey,” Sam said, shaking her a little. “Hey. Look at me. I’m Sam. I’m a mage too, see? I’m going to get you out of here.”

Sam placed his hand on her cut and muttered a healing spell. A warm white light flowed out of his hand. She let out a little gasp of pain and then a moan of relief, as the skin knitted itself together. She opened her eyes and looked at Sam, seeming actually to see him for the first time.

“Thank you,” she whispered. Sam nodded. It was his head that was spinning now. Never mind. He adjusted the arm he had around the girl’s shoulders.

“Can you walk?”

She nodded. “I think so.”

“Right.” Sam clambered to his feet, lifting the girl with him. Her knees wobbled and she slumped her entire weight against him. Sam felt his own legs threaten to buckle and he grimaced. The room went a little blurry at the edges.

_Come on._

She managed to shift a little of her weight onto her own feet.

“Sorry,” she gasped. Sam grunted.

“S’okay.” The room had settled into a stationary state. He was glad she was elven, and even slighter than he was.

They stumbled across to where Irving and the others were. Alistair was supporting Irving. He nodded at Sam.

“Let’s get back to Greagoir, before anything else happens,” the First Enchanter said. He grimaced. “Ooh, why did we have to house the circle in a tower?”

_Why do we need to have a Circle at all, Irving? Got an answer for that one?_

They made their way downstairs. The curving walls of the tower were in fact fantastic supports for those carrying injured mages who weighed almost as much as they did. The girl leaning on Sam broke the silence.

“This is real, isn’t it? This isn’t just some Fade trickery?”

Sam navigated them carefully around the corpse of a templar whose throat had been slashed, blood splattered in a crimson halo around him. His face was oddly calm, the fingers stretched towards his sword the only indicator of his desperation when he had died. Sam kicked the sword out of their way.

“Would it look like this if it were?”

She blinked. “What do you mean?”

Sam stepped over a hunk of sticky flesh. “In my experience, Fade visions are always intensely happy. If a demon were trying to deceive you, don’t you think they’d put a bit more effort into making it pleasant?”

Sam felt her shrug. “I suppose.”

Sam’s point was proved when they came across Cullen, who was still trapped in his cage. He spat at them.

“You let them live! Oh Maker, we are all doomed. How do you know that girl you’re carrying isn’t about to slit your throat and grow ten feet, Surana?”

Sam shrugged. “Well, if you have any problems with it, we can just leave you in there, all nice and safe from us nasty malifecar.”

Cullen blustered. “You might not be a Circle Mage anymore, Surana, but if you think that the Templars will not –“

“Enough!” Wynne snapped. “Irving, please help me remove this barrier. Cullen, know your place. The same goes for you, Sam,” she added when Sam opened his mouth. Sam snapped it shut and placed his spare hand over his heart.

“I am _hurt_.”

The girl laughed and then clutched at her chest. “Ouch, that wasn’t a good idea.”

Sam looked for any more gushing blood. “Are you okay?”

The girl shook her head. “I’m just sore. I’ll be fine.”

“Okay.”

They watched as Irving and Wynne removed Cullen’s cage. He had his arms crossed, pouting like a toddler and shooting daggers at Sam.

“You go at the front,” Wynne ordered him, as soon as he was free. Cullen’s hand edged towards his sword. Alistair’s hand did the same thing. Cullen set his mouth in a firm line and didn’t say anything.

“Sam, you bring up the rear. We’ve had enough fighting for one day.”

Sam didn’t say anything until they started moving.

“Did you say the look on Cullen’s face?” he giggled. The girl smiled a half smile but didn’t say anything.

“I always hated him when I was here,” Sam continued. He’d only arrived a few months or maybe a year before Sam was recruited, but he was new to the job and unnecessarily harsh because he didn’t know what he was doing. He’d give Sam shit for every little thing.

“You were a circle mage?”

“Yeah.”

“I thought I recognized you. Are you the same Sam who joined the Grey Wardens?”

“Yeah.” It seemed the whole tower had been talking about it. It was odd that he only mattered once he had left, after he had spent all those years just blending in with the walls and trying to not jump off them. Did he inspire young mages to dream of the day they would get out of here? _I got lucky. Most of them will never get out._

“I thought you all died at Ostagar.”

“Nope. It’s just me and Alistair now.”

“Ah.”

They continued on in silence for a while. Sam’s arm was starting to ache, and his legs were getting tired. He could only imagine how the girl was feeling.

“What was your name, by the way?”

“Mariel.”

 _I don’t remember you at all._ “Oh.”

“Thank you for saving me, Sam.”

“It’s okay.” Sam was getting very tired now. He didn’t say anything more.

_It’s nice to not fuck something up for once._

_*_

Greagoir was very glad to see Irving alive, and he put Cullen right in his fucking place. Irving promised them mages to help deal with Connor and to fight the Blight. Sam surrendered Mariel to Wynne’s expert care. Wynne begged the Enchanter to let her come along to help the Blight. They had to wait for her to finish up here before they could leave. Sam went outside to wait, unable to breathe the stale, metallic air inside the tower for another second. The sun was setting over Lake Calenhad, sending tails of fire shimmering across its surface. It was a pretty sight really, if you sat where you couldn’t see the tower or feel the chill of its shadow looming over you. Sam slumped against a bank. Yosemite curled up beside him and Sam scratched between his ears, grateful for the warmth against the chilly breeze rising off the water.

The image of the blood mage Sam had set free wouldn’t go away. The desperation on her face as the knife she was holding bit into her own arm, the bitter resignation as she offered him her life. Had she escaped? Even if she had made it past the Templars at the door, they still had her phylactery. She was a dead woman from the moment Sam had come across here, no matter what he decided. Unbidden, a wave of guilt washed over him. Sam bit his lip.

_It was she who decided who become a blood mage. That was when she died, when she became a dead woman. It’s not my fault…_

Sam grimaced and tried to remove his focus to where he was currently. The whisper of the breeze, the coldness of it against his cheek, the damp grass soaking his ass, the rustle of footsteps behind him.

Sam turned his head slightly, tensing himself for the strain of another human being’s presence. He felt too drained for any conversation right now.

It was Alistair. It could have been worse, Sam supposed – it could have been Leliana. He did like her, of course, but her babbling could border on exhausting, especially after a long day. Today had been the longest of days.

Alistair sat down beside Sam, who felt the gap between them like it was crackling with electricity. His fellow warden didn’t say anything, but stretched out his legs, yawning and turning his face to the fading sun like a cat. Sam looked at him out of the corner of his eye, like he was looking at the sun himself. _Don’t make it too obvious._ Alistair’s hair always had that perfect upwards sweep to it. Sam wondered how much time that took. Did Alistair get out of his bed with it looking like that, a victim at the mercy of his own pillow? Did he spend ten minutes in front of a mirror each morning before he left his tent, carefully gelling it into place with…with…

Sam realised that he knew very little about human hair care practices. Did Alistair use tree sap as gel? Pig fat? Did he cook up some little mixture of herbs and spider silk, that he smeared lovingly through his hair each morning? How often did he wash it? Sam, touching his own hair gingerly, remembered that he had not washed it since they had left Redcliffe. It was stiff with sweat and grease, full of grit and doubtless a right sight. Was that Alistair’s secret? Not wash his hair until it acquired enough filth to defy gravity as a solid entity? It didn’t look very dirty, really. It looked like it would be pleasant to run one’s fingers through, to smooth out those few knots and pluck out that one little twig that was sticking out just above Alistair’s ear –

“What are you looking at?” Alistair asked, turning his face slightly towards Sam and giving him that lazy smile. _Don’t blush,_ Sam thought, and he instantly felt heat wash him from head to toe. _Whoops._ Sam leant his face on his hand to try to hide the intense redness that was no doubt flushing his cheeks. _He’s only looking at you! Get a grip!_

“There’s, uh, there’s a stick in your hair.”

Alistair frowned and started patting his head, feeling for it. “Really? Where?”

“It’s just – it’s right –“ Sam tried pointing it out, but Alistair managed to feel every part of his head except for the part where the twig was wedged. He gave Sam a helpless look that made Sam choke on his laughter at the sight of him, patting his head hopelessly and looking like a puppy who couldn’t find his favourite toy.

“It’s right there! It’s – oh, screw it.”

Sam reached over and plucked it out for himself. Alistair’s hair, from the few strands of it he brushed, didn’t seem to be overly greasy or anything. Sam showed Alistair the twig.

“That was in my _hair?_ How long has it been there?” Alistair gasped. “Do you think Morrigan noticed?”

Sam had to laugh at the look of mild terror on Alistair’s face. “I’m sure she would have said something.”

Alistair took the twig and flung it in the direction of the lake. “I’m sure she would have.”

He twisted his face into a Morrigan-esque sneer and said, in the worst falsetto Sam had ever heard, “I see you’ve been doing some grooming, Alistair. Did they teach you that at Templar school?”

Sam laughed and Alistair grinned again, that genuine, easy smile that was Sam was desperately jealous of. The goofy smile that reduced the world to the just the two of them; no Blight, no civil war.  Alistair settled back to his original position, his body stretched out long and lean. Sam felt a little smile of his own. A smile not born of vindictive laughing at Cullen or harsh sarcasm, but a warm little one that fitted with how comfortable he was in this here and now. He leaned back against the bank, gazing at the sunset off to his right, which was conveniently the same place where Alistair’s face was. Yosemite laid his head on Sam’s lap and let out a soft huff of air. Sam scratched him between the ears. In that moment, Sam felt those glass shards settle in place, benign and still for now.

_This is intensely pleasant. Who’d have thought that such a lovely moment could occur in a place like this, with all the pain and death and oppression?_

Sam paused in his scratching, performing mental acrobatics to avoid thinking any more about those particular merits of the tower. _You just had to ruin it, didn’t you?_

He felt a welling surge of anger at himself. _Why are you always like this?_ He patted Yosemite with both hands, a distraction from the swirling grey hurricane that was beginning to spin inside him. The fluff of the fur to make him forget what his mind was yelling at him –

_You can’t have anything nice without dragging it back to how hard your life was, because you were a circle mage! Big deal! Get over it! It wasn’t that bad it wasn’t that bad it wasn’t that bad it wasn’t_

Sam buried his face in Yosemite’s fur and tried not to scream, to let out all the noise inside of him. _Not with Alistair here. Always got to be a secret, keep it inside, be strong be strong bury it all no one can know. No-one can know._ Sam felt like he was being stabbed. He felt like he was dying. He felt like the entire world was screaming at him and he had no idea what it was saying. He wanted somewhere small and dark to hide in –

“Hey, are you alright?” Alistair sounded concerned, his voice cutting like a knife through fog. Sam shuddered and felt a single traitorous tear leak out of his eye and wet Yosemite’s fur. Alistair placed a hand on his shoulder and that was it, he was gone. Sam was absolutely crying now, shaking and gasping, the whole big thing. _Pathetic, pathetic, pathetic._ Sam could barely see with all the crying but he felt Alistair’s arms around him and Alistair…was pulling him in for a hug? This was all his dreams and nightmares combined in one.

“Hey, it’s alright, it’s okay,” Alistair murmured in his ear, which only made Sam cry harder. _Weak._ It was somewhat akin to being hugged by a golem, due to Alistair still wearing his armour, but there was still so much warmth, especially with the night chill coming in. Sam trembled and dripped tears and snot on Alistair’s breastplaste and felt immense gratitude for the big metal arms holding him up and rubbing his back gently and the voice murmuring reassuring things. _This is terribly embarrassing._ Every time Sam felt like he had finished he remembered that he was doing this all in front of Alistair and he got another burst of tears. It was…it was…

Finally, he ran out of energy and slumped there, limp and frail and not daring to look at Alistair’s face because he would only see there what his head was screaming at him, _WEAK_ and it would break his heart more surely than anything else in this awful, awful day.

Alistair’s hand rubbed him on the back again, gentle, firm, comforting. “Hey,” he murmured. “You alright in there?”

Sam nearly lost it again. _He cares he cares he cares_ He dashed a hand across his dripping eyes and let out a laugh with no humour in it whatsoever. “I’ve been better.”

Sam hated that part of him, that it was all he could say. Joke through it. Alistair didn’t reply but squeezed him tighter. Sam, now that water was now longer torrenting from his eyes, took a moment to assess their position. Alistair had dragged him over, meaning that Sam was kind of kneeling with the top half of his body being supported by Alistair. One of his hands was poking out of the hug, kind of around Alistair’s torso but not quite, while the other was wedged in next to Sam’s face. Not the most comfortable hug, what with the armour and all, but functionally it was superb. Sam felt the post-cry emptiness fill with a little warmth and relief and _support,_ oh Maker, it was so nice to let someone else take some of the weight, to not drown in the illusion that you were alone. This feeling was compounded by Yosemite licking Sam’s outstretched fingertips. Sam sighed and rested his head against Alistair’s breastplate, suddenly deeply and heavily tired to his very bones.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Alistair asked, his voice suddenly right next to Sam’s ear. Sam didn’t have the energy to think about the exciting possible implications of _that_ right now. He considered the question, considered the effort that would require on a day that just made him want to crawl into a bed and not leave for a year.

“Not really,” he whispered, his voice hoarse and croaky from the crying. “Not now.”

Alistair squeezed him a little tighter.

“When you do, I’ll be here,” Alistair said. Sam felt like he would melt into the metal of the armour surrounding him. _When you do…he cares, he cares!_

“Thank you,” Sam managed to say. “Please keep hugging me, it’s really…it’s really nice.”

“Sure thing. Hey, look, a shooting star!”

Sam managed to turn enough in the vice of Alistair’s hug to see what he was pointing at. There it was, indeed. Alistair was probably smiling about it. Sam didn’t want to look at his face, because it might get awkward and Alistair might stop hugging him and right now Alistair was the only thing in the universe that felt like it wasn’t disintegrating on him. What was this, anyway? Was this gay? Was this a tender moment between friends? Did Alistair like him or was he just being nice? Just guys being dudes?  

Sam heard Alistair saying something silly and funny and pointless and felt the warmth of his body, even through the armour, and decided that it didn’t matter right now. Right now, Alistair was his strength. Alistair was exactly what he needed. Sam nestled his head into his shoulder. _Please don’t ever stop hugging me._


	7. So...uh...y'know...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Where did all this angst come from?

Alistair talked to Sam a lot on the journey back to Redcliffe. Or did he only seem to talk to him more? Sam hadn’t been able to manage more than a grunt on the journey to the tower. He tried, now. He forced some words out, in response to Alistair’s jokes and comments and questions. If he responded with a question of his own, he could make Alistair talk about himself for a while. It was cheating, to brush off a “How are you?” with “What was your time in the Templars like?” or “Tell me abut the Wardens”, but Sam always listened to Alistair’s answers. The terrible jokes Alistair made could drag a little smile out of him, even on days when the world weighed heavier and darker on Sam’s shoulders than the clouds that clung to the landscape. Alistair’s face saddened whenever he talked about Duncan or the wardens. Sam clumsily patted him on his shoulder, muttered something about how Duncan would be proud of Alistair. Sam didn’t have a fucking clue what Duncan would think. It seemed to help Alistair, though.

“Sam…do you want to talk about it?”

It was the first time Alistair had asked him since they had left the tower a week ago. Sam blinked at him. They were looking for fallen trees to chop up for firewood, the light gloomy and thick under the canopy. The menacing grey clouds smothering the sky didn’t exactly help much. Sam could only see only the glint of the axe in Alistair’s hands – his face was shrouded in shadows and unreadable. Sam felt a little sliver of suspicion at his role in this. He didn’t have much firewood carrying capability, after all. He wasn’t _strong._

“Talk about what?”

Alistair stopped, placing one foot on a fallen tree log. He motioned for Sam to stay back. Sam, who hadn’t moved since Alistair had first spoken, stayed where he was and shoved his hands in his pockets. Alistair’s axe flashed in the air and bit into the wood with a hard thunk that made Sam wince.

“Talk about the time you wrestled three greased nugs, of course! I’m dying to know.”

The axe came down again, again, again. Sam followed it with his eyes, up and down and up and down and up and down. Shiny.

“Oh, of course. That.”

Alistair stopped and looked at Sam.

“Well, do you?”

Gently, tenderly, Sam bit the inside of his lip to prevent himself from screaming.

“No.”

“Are you sure? I mean, you’ve been talking to me a lot these past few days and I – I really appreciate your support. I mean, maybe I could help you as well…”

Alistair’s voice trailed off as Sam found himself unable to look at Alistair’s sweet and shadowy face. The ground was a good thing to stare at. There was a swirling inside himself again.

“Oh, I don’t think I’m quite ready for that right now,” Sam’s voice said. Alistair nodded.

“Well, if you do….”

A twist of guilt knotted itself in Sam’s stomach. He almost called out to Alistair as he returned his attention to the log. _He doesn’t care…but he_ does _care. You know he does care, you’ve seen it, but you won’t let yourself do it. I can’t burden him like that. He wants to help you. I’m fine. He doesn’t need to worry._

 

*

Alistair asked again a few days later. It had been a long day, filled with two darkspawn ambushes. With the arrival of Wynne, Sam no longer felt like he was going to pass out into his soup bowl at dinner. He and Alistair were the only two left around the campfire that night.

“How are you, these days?”

Sam shrugged.

“That’s what you said last time.”

Sam looked at him and saw the look in his eyes and felt his own burn with tears that threatened to sear his cheeks. He looked away and pretended to sneeze, rubbing a hand across his face.

“I’m fine.” Impressive how his voice didn’t quaver. _No, I’m not, why am I like this Alistair please help me –_

“Of course you are.” Alistair stretched out an arm and patted Sam on the back. Startled, Sam tensed at the sudden touch, but relaxed into the sensation.

“Turn around,” Alistair said. Sam swivelled so his back was facing Alistair and let out a soft noise when Alistair began to rub it. He was inexpert but gentle and Sam felt his entire body relax. His eye slid closed.

“They taught you this at the monastery?”

Sam could _hear_ the blush in Alistair’s voice. “No, I just, uh, thought you might like it. I asked Leliana. Do you like it?” He was anxious.

Sam hummed softly.

“Yes,” he said after a moment, when he remembered the question. Alistair let out a soft huff of air. _He was holding his breath?_

He was still and nothing was hurting him but it was a warm, glowing stillness, not the harsh one with the lies and the coldness and the wall with a tiny little person lurking in the shadows of it. Just warmth and calm. Sam leaned back into Alistair’s hands. Alistair was running some babble that drizzled through Sam’s brain like water, gone in an instant. Sam, drifting in a kind world that wasn’t attached to his real body, heard a silence and filled it with a few words, words that cut on the way out but felt a little soothed by the hands touching him, holding him up.

“I hated every second in that tower.”

“I don’t have any idea what I’m doing.”

“I feel like…the tower has broken every part of me that could ever have a real relationship or care about other people or… or…”

Sam’s voice cracked and he buried his face in his hands.

“All I have is sarcasm and bitterness,” he moaned.

“That’s not true,” Alistair said.

“It is.”

“It’s not.”

“Are you inside my head, Alistair? What the fuck do you know?” Sam’s voice rose and quavered at the top, cracking. He dashed away the fresh tears leaking from his eyes. At least his back was already to Alistair. At least Alistair could only hear and not see this disaster that he was.

“I’ve seen it,” Alistair said, firm, quiet, certain. Sam choked out a laugh.

“Of course you have.”

“I have!” Alistair insisted. His voice dropped to a soft intensity as he continued. “I’ve seen you pass out because you cast too many healing spells. You carried a mage all the way down from the tower. You forgave that blood mage and let her go.”

“Does that annoy you?” Sam remembered Alistair demanding he kill Jowan.

Alistair didn’t say anything.

“I killed Jowan. Did you like that? Did that please your Templar sensibilities?”

“Sam –“

“She probably died anyway. There’s no way she could’ve gotten past the Templars. What does it matter what I did? She was already dead. Who cares? Who gives a fuck? There are more important things to worry about, like killing darkspawn and dealing with this stupid demon in Redcliffe and, oh yeah, Teyrn Loghain is trying to get the entire country to murder us. How could I forget that?”

Sam choked and buried his head in his hands. There were tears streaming down his face now. Why were there always tears? Why could he not just spit all this out with a straight face, climb back inside himself, and block off the entire outside world? Stop letting these shards of glass tear at him. They were glass. They should have shattered by now. Shatter them. _Do_ something –

A pair of arms pulled Sam in for a hug. Sam let out a choked gasp of surprise, and relaxed into it. The glass was crunching together. Alistair didn’t say anything.

“You smell bad,” Sam said at last, rubbing his no longer dripping eyes, a hollow feeling of awkwardness settling in his stomach. How do you continue a conversation like this? Alistair laughed.

“So do you.”

“I do not!”

“Live in denial if you want.”

Sam let out a half hearted chuckle, his mood sinking again. “Like I do with everything else?”

And there went the mood again.

“Do you see that? I just ruined everything again,” Sam muttered. “Why do you even bother talking to me?”

“I – I don’t like seeing you upset.”

“Oh.” Sam scrunched his eyes shut. _Don’t say things like that. Dangerous, dangerous, dangerous. He’s just being nice, remember? Remember remember remember – wait, am I even sure of that? He’s never had sex before, he probably doesn’t know how to flirt –_

Sam opened his eyes and stared straight ahead, willed himself away from the edge of that particular cliff. _It’s not worth it. It’s not worth the heartache. Stop getting your fucking hopes up stop it stop it stop it –_

Sam wriggled himself free of Alistair’s arms, shivering as the cold night air hit him. _Don’t even think about trying to get those arms around you again._

“I’m going to bed. Nice talk.” Sam stood up, his voice not cracking once. He didn’t look at Alistair. It was too hard to look at Alistair, these days.

Alistair started to say something. Sam didn’t hear him, or didn’t want to. He stalked into his tent and flopped onto his blankets.

 _Stop being so sad. You have things to do._ He ground his fists into his eyes and drew a long, shuddering breath. Well, he didn’t have to do them right now, did he? He’d be sad if he wanted, and he didn’t have to talk to anyone about it.

Yosemite slunk in and lay next to him. The tent flap was still open, letting in fingers of freezing night air that caressed Sam’s cheek. He shivered but didn’t get up to close it, instead yanking a handful of blankets over himself. His robes were muddy and slightly damp and probably wrecking the blankets, but he didn’t care enough to take them off. Yosemite snuffled and nosed under the blankets, wriggling his head in between Sam’s arms and his body forward until Sam was hugging him. A big wet tongue slithered over Sam’s face.

The corner of Sam’s mouth twitched. The mabari licked him again, nuzzling his nose against Sam’s collarbone. A giggle bubbled up inside Sam.

“Stop tickling me,” he whispered. Yosemite licked him right on the lips and Sam sputtered. Pulling back reproachfully, Sam saw in the dim light that the dog’s mouth was hanging open like he was smiling.

“Dumbass,” Sam muttered, but he squeezed Yosemite even tighter. He’d never have pegged himself for a dog person. There’d been no pets at the tower, so how could he have known? From the moment he’d seen the mabari cowering in the pen, whimpering as the darkspawn taint burned through him, Sam had felt something inside him twist with sympathy and an overwhelming, instant and unconditional love. It had been a rush of warmth, a lifting of his heart when Yosemite’s trusting eyes gazed into his, soft with pain. There had been anger too, a clawing rage and the knowledge that he would protect this animal with his own life, would bleed for it, would spill the blood of others for it. The tower had never prepared him for anything like it. His whole life had been cold and empty but here was this dog that loved and trusted him no matter what. Loving him was so simple, so immediate.

A certain ex-templar, on the other hand…Sam groaned and buried his face in Yosemite’s fur. _You don’t love him! He doesn’t love you, he’s just cute and the fresh air is addling your head…anyway, you have more important things to do. You have an entire country to save! You can’t spend your time mooning over some cute boy!_

He’d never had the freedom to before. He’d never thought himself capable. He’d thought the circle had broken him.

_Do I really know that it hasn’t?_

The glass tore into him, vindictive that he could have forgotten it, jealous and sadistic.

_Ugh, don’t go there._

Talking didn’t help him at all. He knew that now. Find that old stillness again. Go back inside himself, go back where nowhere could hurt him. Rebuild that bitter wall.

_I never cried when I was at the tower._

As tears began to dampen Yosemite’s fur, Sam wondered to himself, _why do I have to start now?_

 

*

“It would have been so easy to back out of that situation, but you kept the family intact. Thank you.”

Sam looked at his boots and shrugged a little. How do you respond to praise? He didn’t have any experience.

“Maybe we can get through this Blight after all,” Alistair continued.

“Yeah.” Sam didn’t mention that that demon he was supposed to have killed was far from dead. No, that was best kept a secret. _Until you turn into a malificar and start murdering everyone in camp?_ No, that wasn’t going to happen. It was going to be fine. He could handle this. Sam nodded at Alistair and they moved on.  

“So, we’re heading to Denerim next?”

“Yeah. To find the sacred ashes guy.”

Alistair nodded. “Right. Uh, can I ask a favour?”

“What?”

Alistair fiddled with his belt buckle, staring intently at it.

“Will you come with me to talk to my sister?”

Sam frowned. “You have a sister?”

“Yes, in Denerim. We’ve never met and I was hoping you could come along for…emotional support.”

Sam wondered what good he could possibly do. If it went badly, he supposed could burn her house down or something.

“Sure.”

Alistair’s face lifted in relief.

“Thank you.”

“Sure.”

The conversational lapsed into an awkward, stilted silence. Sam looked over Alistair’s left shoulder, avoiding his eyes. Alistair made a noise like he was going to say something, but nothing came out. Was Sam the one who was supposed to be talking here? It seemed like a natural thing for the conversation to flow from Alistair’s emotional difficulties to Sam’s, but here was Sam, being a dam to the conversation’s natural course. He bit his lip. He couldn’t just walk away again, not like that other time, that was _rude,_ and wasn’t that statement just the description of Sam’s life? Sam was rude. There was nothing he could do about it. Okay, fine, there was but that involved _effort_ and he couldn’t be sensitive to the world and remain unhurt and still; the glass would tear him apart. The air was laden with expectation of something, anything. It weighed down upon Sam and made him feel smaller than ever, especially compared to big, strong, tall Alistair. But he would not give in.

They’d been standing there for some minutes in resolute silence. One of them should have said something by now. Sam should have discussed his emotional difficulties. Talked about how their current situation was making him feel. It wouldn’t have helped, but that was what people did, apparently. Well, humans. _I’m not a human._ Sam didn’t know about elves.

“Okay,” Sam said. Alistair looked at him, his eyes lighting up with hope. _Sorry, buddy._ “Tell me about….ah, tell me about this sister of yours. How’d you know about her?”

Alistair tried to look Sam in the eye. Sam turned his head to the side, suddenly very interested in Yosemite pawing at Morrigan for a scrap of food. He heard Alistair sigh.

“Don’t you ever get tired of hearing me talk about myself?”

Morrigan held her plate in the air and glared at Yosemite, spitting out some words that were likely very rude.

“No,” said Sam.

“What if, for a change –“

“No.”

“Are you su-“

“Yes, I’m fucking sure!” Sam turned at last to look at Alistair, burning with anger, his eyes blurred with rage. “Stop asking me! I don’t want to talk about it, I don’t want your – your – I don’t want your _sympathy._ Talking about how _sad_ and _distressed_ I am is not going to magically make me feel better. Talking doesn’t do shit and _I don’t want to!”_

Sam nearly yelled the last words, spitting them in Alistair’s face. Alistair looked shocked. Morrigan gave them a quizzical look, affording Yosemite an opportunity to nab her last drumstick. Sam waved dismissively, dropping his arm to his side like a lead weight. The anger drained out of him like someone had pulled the plug. He didn’t know what he felt. It was a kind of emptiness.

“I’m sorry,” Alistair murmured after a moment

Sam nodded and stared at his feet.

“I don’t like talking about myself either, you know.”

“What?”

“You always come along to me and ask me all those stupid questions about my life and make me talk about all this menial shit and then you get angry at me when I ask you how you are.”

There was steel in Alistair’s voice. Shocked, Sam looked up at Alistair. Anger was beginning to cloud his face, furrow his brows, set his mouth into a grim slash.

“What?” was all Sam could say.

“You know everything about me and I know nothing about you!”

“Well, it’s not my fault that you never stop talking!” Sam snapped.

“Yeah? You can’t start talking! You haven’t said a single word about yourself in all the time we’ve been together, I don’t know you from some drip we plucked out of the gutter –“

“Like yourself, you mean?” Sam spat. He saw in Alistair’s face that he was being devastatingly unfair but he didn’t care, his mouth was doing that thing where it ran regardless of instruction. _This is wrong this is wrong stop stop STOP you don’t believe this it’s not tru –_

“I apologise that the hardest thing in my life wasn’t being sent off to learn how to murder mages! Should I tell you what it was like being on the other side of that sword? Do you want to know the intimate details of what it’s like to spend your entire life with someone who would like nothing more to run you through with their sword a few metres from you at all times? Or would that be a little too much reality for you? Would you rather go play with your little horsey puppet?”

“You know I never wanted to be a Templar,” Alistair said quietly, after a moment where the air rung with the weight of Sam’s words. Sam wanted to snatch them up, make them unsaid, shove them back inside himself and crush that traitorous lying part of himself that churned them out. Instead he took a deep breath.

“Oh yes, I forgot. I apologize _deeply._ Did the reality of my life disturb your delicate sensibilities? Do you still want me to tell it to you? Should I tell you about the time I was dragged out of my bed in the middle of night, had a demon shoved inside and was told to fight it off or they would slit my throat? Or is that too difficult for you to hear? Should I tell you about when I – I –“

Sam found his voice trailing off as the glass inside spasmed, mangled his insides, turned his chest into throbbing fire. Like the time he’d – no. He glared at Alistair.

“Sam –“

Sam felt that his chin was wobbling a little, his eyes threatening to leak, Alistair looking a little blurry. He swallowed and held his chin up high. He couldn’t tell what expression was on Alistair’s face. The anger had faded, to be replaced with – what? One of the glass shards near his stomach wriggled around sadistically, making Sam draw in a sharp breath.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” he said, managing to continue to stare directly at Alistair while doing so. _Still. Stay still._ His voice didn’t tremble. The shard gave one last warning stab and then settled. Alistair nodded, his jaw tight. He didn’t say anything.

“Let’s – let’s go back to the fire.”

Alistair nodded again, his expression unchanged and unreadable still.

There was that silence at the fire as well, that kind of silence where the air is thick and still crackling with the electricity of the storm that came before it. An expectant silence. An awkward one. Sam realised that everyone must have heard him. Their eyes followed him as he settled uncomfortably onto the log seat around the fire. He jerked his head awkwardly at them. This would have been a good time for an inspiring, leaderly speech, or perhaps an apology. Sam could offer neither. He stared into the flames and tried to ignore that their stares felt like ants crawling on his skin.

Sten was the first to leave, claiming a need for rest. After that, everyone offered their excuses and slunk off to their tents. Even Wynne seemed not to have any condescending words of elderly wisdom for him. _She’s probably saving them up. Fermenting them to make them stronger, like with wine._ Sam shuddered.

Yosemite sidled over and rested his head on Sam’s knee. As what was a reflex now, Sam scratched him between the ears.

“Just us now, huh boy?”

Sam wasn’t sure what he was feeling. He didn’t feel like crying. There was a wave of guilt somewhere in the distance, held off by the sphere of stillness around his inner self. _Don’t care and nothing can hurt you._ It had worked in the tower. Sam remembered the anger and hurt in Alistair’s face, obvious as if someone had written over it.

_I don’t think it’s going to work now._


	8. Chapter Assassineight

“I have many other…skills besides assassinating, if that interests you,”

Zevran grinned at Sam, seeming completely oblivious to the blood running down his face from where Sten had knocked him out. The sword Alistair was holding to his throat didn’t seem to faze him either. Sam stared.

“Did you – did you just _wink_ at me?”

Zevran only grinned wider, showing off glistening white teeth. Sam felt a smile on his face.

“Right, so you want to come along with us, and you pinky-promise not to murder us?”

“And I’ll make it worth your while.” Zevran winked again. Sam felt the weight of the past few days of heavy, awkward silence lift a little. He was allowed to have a little fun, wasn’t he? If Zevran _did_ try to kill them all, well, he hadn’t exactly been very successful the first time, had he? Having someone along who didn’t stare at him like he was about to start screaming or slash his own wrists at any minute would be a nice change. Someone who didn’t hate him completely.

It had been a week since his outburst. Alistair hadn’t said a word to him in all that time, setting his jaw and looking away whenever Sam tried to catch his eye. There was an insidious guilt grinding in the pit of Sam’s stomach. _I should never have said that._ An apology was the thing to do, what any decent person should do, but the thought of it lacerated his insides. The glass shards were not going to let him move again, sliced at him every time he opened his mouth. The others had tried to talk to him, and he’d nodded along dutifully, saying yes and shrugging at all the right times. The words cut into him like even more shards, so that he was being torn apart from outside at the same time as from inside. _Alistair hates me._ The look on Alistair’s face, the betrayal in his eyes and the hurt, was seared onto the inside of his eyelids. He hadn’t slept in days.

Zevran was looking at him expectantly.

“So? What’s it going to be?”

Sam shook himself back to the dirt he was crouched upon, the scowl on Alistair’s face, like being this close to Sam physically repulsed him. It probably did.

“Has anyone ever told you that you’re very attractive when you’re debating whether or not to kill them?” Zevran butted in.

“I can’t say that they have,” Sam replied, distracted for a second from the crushing weight on top of him and the ache in his chest. Zevran stretched, showing off his lean and muscular body. _I couldn’t be less interested, I’m sorry._

Still. A distraction. Sam held out his hand.

“Come on, then.”

 

*

“So, what is it with you and Alistair?”

Sam blinked. “What?”

“You seem like you’re angry at each other.”

“It’s none of your business,” Sam snapped. Zevran held up his hands.

“Woah, woah, I’m sorry! It is none of my business, you’re right.”

He went back to playing with one of his daggers. Sam watched him for a while. The lump of guilt in the base of Sam’s stomach grew a little larger. It was weighing him down, hunching him over when he tried to stand. He couldn’t push Zevran away as well, he realised. He couldn’t be completely alone. _Gotta start reducing that guilt somehow, right?_

“We had a fight,” Sam offered, tenuously testing each word against the current that threatened to dash them against rocks, the current that trapped him inside himself because he couldn’t cross it. The glass stirred but it wasn’t too bad, it was bearable, he’d weathered worse. Sam let out the breath he’d been holding. A conversation. He could do this.

“Ah,” said Zevran. He spun one of the daggers on his finger, the blade flashing orange in the firelight. “Was it about something important?”

Sam watched as the knife spin and shine like a flickering star.

“I – I don’t know. I think it was.” Sam clenched his fists and dredged up the memory of the words they’d said. The glass shrieked in protest and Sam squeezed his eyes shut, dug deeper. He’d said he didn’t want to talk; yet here he was talking to Zevran. He’d said all those awful things. _Was that enough talking for you, Alistair?_ Sam winced.

“I was really rude to him,” Sam whispered, his breath shallow to keep the glass in place. The words scraped at his throat, tore at it as they came out, but they came out. “I didn’t mean it, and I still haven’t apologised, and now he hates me.”

Zevran nodded.

“He said I- “ Sam stopped. _Don’t talk enough_ hung in his throat, unsaid, too large and heavy and stuck now. It was difficult to breath around it. _Isn’t this fitting?_ Sam looked down at his hands, his head spinning suddenly and the pain, oh the pain, the glass inside ripping him apart. It was odd hurting like this, a pain without blood. You couldn’t cast a few healing spells to make it go away. Sam could cast healing spells until he passed out and it wouldn’t make a dent, he’d wake up just the same. In agony and alone.

“What did he say?” Zevran asked. The sound of his voice reminded Sam that he was here, that he could feel the log underneath his butt and the heat of the fire on his face. The fresh air tugging at his hair. Not in the tower. He didn’t have to be the same person he was in the tower, did he? It wouldn’t kill him to say something. The glass tearing at his chest begged to differ but Sam took a breath and spat out the words, marvelling as the glass stilled afterward. Talking made him feel better? He shouldn’t be surprised; it wasn’t like he’d spent so many nights sobbing into Yosemite’s fur because he couldn’t make himself do just that.

“He said I don’t talk enough.” Even Sam could hear the glumness in his tone, the sob just below the surface of the words. _Pathetic._

“Well, prove him wrong then.”

Sam chuckled without humour. “It’s not that simple.”

A shard dug at him, proving his point. An image of the tower spun into view, a twisted memory of Templars yelling malificar and drawing shimmering blades, and the agony in his chest just like it was now. Sam gasped and pushed the memory away.

“He wants me to talk about myself and I can’t – I can’t do that.”

“Then don’t.”

“What the hell do I talk about, then?”

Zevran tossed his knife in the air and caught it, grinning. “Anything! Talk about the weather, about your favourite dinner, about how you’re going to stop the Blight.”

Sam stared at him. “I don’t know if I can do that.”

“You’re talking to me, aren’t you?”

“I…suppose…”

Yes, here he was, spilling his life secrets to some assassin who had tried to kill him only two days ago. Sam marvelled at this.  Zevran continued.

“Look, the way I see it, you two are the last Grey Wardens left, yes? If you’re going to stop the Blight together you should at least try to get along.”

Sam felt like there was a double meaning to “get along” in that sentence, an allusion to the kind of “getting along” that involved the removal of some, if not all, clothing. Zevran winked, which secured that theory. Sam felt a bizarre urge to laugh.

“I see.”

Zevran grinned. Sam felt the pain in his chest recede. It had gone down after he’d started talking, but now it was almost gone. The shards were still, but instead of the stillness where they were sitting in the wounds they’d cut, they had pulled closer to their original positions, some almost touching. A core of strength? No, there were gaps, it was ready to surge apart at a moment’s notice (the thought of talking to Alistair made them twist a little and wriggle, like they were bursting with energy that needed releasing) but it was something. Some kind of very weak strength. Sam took a deep breath and clutched onto it.

“I’ll try to talk to him.”

Zevran beamed at him. Sam forced a weak smile back, Alistair’s hurt face drifting to his mind.

_Oh, Maker._


	9. Denerum

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> At this point my characterization of Alistair is basically just "and then Alistair said something funny". Who cares? I probably should.

“Well, this is Denerim,” Sam said, as they walked through the gates of Denerim. This was leadership, was it not? Telling people what to do. Pointing out the obvious. Being assertive. All that. They went straight to the house of the scholar who knew about the Urn of Sacred Ashes. He wasn’t there, but his assistant was, and having Sten be in the same room and crack his knuckles at the same time as Sam was speaking made him remarkably willing to show them all the information he had.

After that, they went to check out the marketplace and somehow, in the noisy chaos of all the citizens looking to buy and sell their grandmother’s jewellry, Sam lost track of his companions. One minute Sten was right next to him, munching on a sweet cinnamon roll with a blissful expression on his face; the next Sam turned to ask him what he thought of these gloves and instead of Sten he was faced with a tiny trembling old man. The man gave him a poisonous look full of all the bitterness of a long and wasted life and shuffled off.

“Okay,” Sam said. “Bye. Sten?”

He called out, but his voice was swallowed by the clamour of the crowd. Sten would be a head above the rest of the crowd, easy to find, but Sam was a head _below_ everyone else. He couldn’t see a thing. So many humans. Where were all the elves, he wondered as he elbowed his way through them. Weren’t there supposed to be elves in Denerim?

All these humans stank. Maybe it was just the city, but nonetheless the entire air seemed thick with the reek of piss, dog shit and rotting food. Sam felt like he was choking. The jostling bodies around him were closing in, crushing him. The circle of sky above him was shrinking, the noise of the crowd ringing in his ears, his feet slipping in something slippery and unidentified and threatening to send him toppling to the ground, to be crushed underfoot like some insect. Sam fought his way through the crowd, ignoring the offended complaints and yells of “Watch it, knife ears!”. He considered using an earthquake spell to shake them all off their stupid feet so he could get through, but that was probably several different kinds of rude. Shoving people aside to get through a crowd was pushing it enough already. Sam spied a side alley, miraculously free of people, and ducked into it, taking a few deep breaths.

There had been nothing like this at the circle. There were more people in this square than in the entire tower. Sam had probably seen scenes like this every day, when he lived in the alienage, but he had no memory of it. It was bizarre and terrifying. He sat down on a crate for a moment to slow his racing heart.

Calm at last, Sam stood on the crate and scanned the crowd again. Sten should be easy to find. He was nearly one and a half times as tall as Sam. But no, there was no sign of him. The crowd had swallowed him up like a great beast consuming a cow whole.

Sam tried looking for his other companions. They’d all split up a while ago. Alistair had wanted to go look at the Wonders of Thedas. Leliana was at the Chantry. Sam didn’t remember what the others were doing. At any rate, they were going to meet at the inn that night. The inn – what was it called again?

“Oh dear,” said Sam, as he felt in the pockets of his robes for his money pouch, which had a piece of paper with the inn’s name written on it inside. “Oh, _fuck.”_

It was gone. Some little shit had pickpocketed him.

 _It’s okay. It’s fine. The others have money and I just need to find them, right? Can’t be too hard. Can’t be too hard._ Sam stared at the seething mass of people and decided there was no way he was going in there again. Okay. Skirt around the outside. Leliana was at the Chantry, wasn’t she? They’d passed the Chantry on the way here, it was just on the other side of the square and down that street and turn right and there it was. Easy.

Sam edged his way around, clinging to the buildings. He reached the corner and paused. Which street was it again? Everything looked different from this side. It must be that one, the closer one, that would be about opposite from where he was before. He craned his neck to spot the alley he was in before but he couldn’t see a thing through the throng of people. _It must be the right one._ He went down it and looked for the right turn. There weren’t any. Sam reached a corner at the end of the street and looked down, but it didn’t look familiar. Or rather, it looked exactly the same as everywhere else. There was a little worm of panic in the pit of Sam’s stomach that began to wriggle.

 _No, it’s fine. It was a right turn when we came this way, so it must be a left turn coming the other way, right?_ There was a street leading left. Sam turned into it. No Chantry. _It must be a bit further, then…_

At least there were less people here. Sam reached a four way junction and looked around for a sign, but no such luck. He took a deep breath, that panic worm getting more agitated with every passing second. _No, it’s fine. It’s left. Come on. Keep taking left turns and you’ll get there._

The streets were endless, more and more corners to turn and still no Chantry or anything he recognised. The panic worm was writhing now. Sam began to run. _Just round the next corner, come on come on come on –_

A dead end. Sam skidded to a stop and doubled over, gasping. _It’s okay it’s okay I made a wrong turn somewhere, just got to go back._ He bit his lip. _don’t panic don’t panic don’t panic don’t panic_

Go back to the turn, go left instead of right. This wasn’t a dead end but a winding back alley, crooked as a broken leg. It rapidly became too narrow for even a horse to fit through, the buildings on either side looming like walls. Sam gulped and considered retracing his steps. _No. Come on. It has to lead somewhere._ Onwards he pressed, his skin crawling and his stomach somersaulting. The walls were leaning inwards, he was sure of it, they were about to topple and crush him –

Sam faltered to a stop, his chest shrinking and he couldn’t breathe, he couldn’t _breathe_ and why was he standing here, he was going to get crushed he needed to move he needed to get out of here he needed to –

Run. Sam sprinted the rest of the alley, his head spinning and his chest not letting in any more air as first his legs and then his entire body burned. Duck around the scaffolding in the way. It was about to collapse, anyone could see it, why would you live in this city? There were dark blotches blocking the edges of his vision. Light! There, right ahead. Sam spilled out onto the street and sank to his knees, drawing in huge gulps of precious, precious, oxygen.

There was the sun, warm and bright as ever. Sam tipped his head towards it, shut his eyes and moaned as the fire drained from his legs. He’d feared for a moment that he would never see it again. That it would be like the tower – _stop that._

“Hey, you’re blocking the way,” he heard someone say. Sam opened his eyes and realized that this street did in fact have people on it. He got to his feet and stood aside. This place didn’t look at all familiar. The buildings were shabbier than the ones by the marketplace, like they were made by nailing together all the large pieces of wood one could find and calling it a structure. The people passing by wore faded clothes, their eyes tipped downwards and their faces lined.

Well, he wasn’t going back through that alley, at any rate, He’d find his friends. They had to be somewhere, right?

“Um,” Sam said to one of the people passing him. It was a hairy, filthy man who leered at him, exposing broken yellow teeth. “Can you tell me how to get to the Chantry?”

 _Nice one,_ Sam reflected. _That was almost polite._

The man’s thin, chapped lips twisted into a grin. He leaned in close to Sam. The smell radiating from his mouth revealed that he had apparently eaten rotten meat for lunch.

“How about you give me one last ride before you go, sweetheart,” he rasped. “Those chantry cows are always taking the pretty ones.”

Sam kneed him in the balls. “I’m not your sweetheart!” he yelled.

The man doubled over and glared at him, spat on the ground.

“I’ll get you for that, you little bitch,” he snarled. “You won’t be making any smart comments with my co –“

He was cut short by the fireball Sam threw right in his face. He yelled and clawed at his skin, but that only made the flames spread to his hands. Sam dashed into the crowd the man’s screams had attracted, shoving onlookers aside with shaking hands. His entire body was shaking, his breath ragged in his throat. _Sweetheart sweetheart sweetheart sweetheart sweetheart…._

He needed to get out of here, get anywhere but here. The look in the man’s eyes was burned onto his own. The hunger – Sam stopped and leaned against a wall for support as another shudder racked his body. _If I hadn’t been a mage – if I hadn’t –_

No. That wasn’t helping. Sam rubbed at the hot tears in his tears and tried to keep moving, but his legs felt like they would give way underneath him if he let go of this wall. _Sweetheart…_ the shards of glass writhed in his chest and he gasped, slipping downwards a little.

He became aware of the conversation of the men across the street from him.

“Maker, I love market days. She’s drunk already.”

“Do you think she belongs to anyone?”

“Who gives a fuck? She’s not going to be able to do anything about it.”

“God, those elf women always have tiny tits but they’re absolutely fucking gorgeous when you get their clothes off.”

“As long as you ignore their ears, that is.”

“Hey, do you think it’s true that elves are pointed between their legs as well?”

One of them laughed and shoved the speaker.

“Why don’t you go find out, then?”

They started to move across the road to Sam. _Time to go._ Sam started walking away. His legs were a little wobbly with the aftermath of that adrenaline, but they were getting a new shot to replenish it.

“Hey, I just want to talk, pretty thing!” one of them called out, and snatched his arm. Sam gave him a jolt of electricity so hard that his eyes rolled back in his skull and he thudded to the ground.

“I’m not a fucking girl,” Sam snarled, and started running again. They didn’t follow him. Sam rounded a corner and slowed to walk again, his heart in his throat, its pulse sending rage to every fibre of his aching body. _Pretty pretty pretty –_ he wanted to yell, scream. _I need to get out of here._ Where was everyone? Where was the inn? What was it fucking called?

He eventually found his way to a part of that city where the buildings swayed a little less in the breeze. He asked an old lady selling knitted things on a street corner where the Chantry was. She must have seen something in his eyes because she offered to come with him, dearie.

“It’s not safe for a young woman to be alone in a place like this,” she said.

“I’m not a woman,” Sam said, biting his tongue on the additive “you stupid motherfucker”. She chuckled and patted his arm.

“Of course you’re not, sweetie.”

Sam tried not to scream.

The chantry was only a few long minutes away. Sam felt himself relax at the sight of it, something he’d never have expected of himself. But here was something familiar, at last. He ditched the lady and asked the women chanting out front if they’d seen an Orlesian woman with ginger hair. She’d left a while ago, and she didn’t know where she’d gone.

“Oh,” said Sam, feeling that little panic worm again. “Have you seen a Qunari?”

They hadn’t.

“Could you – where’s the Wonders of Thedas?”

Alistair was the last person Sam wanted to see, but he was the most likely to still be in the same place, admiring all the little trinkets for hours. It was just around the corner. Sam spent the walk there repeating the directions to himself and worrying that he’d lose the way again. But there was the sign, flapping in the breeze, and Sam felt an immense weight lift in his chest.

Alistair was in the back of the store, looking at runestones. Sam shuffled towards him, each step slower and slower as the memory of all the things he’d said rung in his ears. But he wasn’t going back out there either.

“Hi,” Sam said, when he was somewhat close. Alistair looked up and scowled when he saw who it was.

“Hello,” he said, returning to very pointedly looking at his runestones and not at Sam. Sam took a deep breath. The glass gave him a warning stab. He remembered Zevran’s words. _Talk!_

“Alistair, I –“

The glass slashed at him and Sam stopped. Alistair didn’t look up. _TALK! You mean it, just say it just say it just say it –_

“Alistair, I’m sorry.”

Alistair said nothing.

“What I said to you was – I didn’t mean it, I should never have said it and I don’t believe it. I, uh, you, uh, you, um – I mean –“

Sam wrung his hands. Alistair was gazing very closely at a rune.

“I didn’t want to – I mean, I was –“

How did he say this? What did he want to say? His chest ached.

“I know you never wanted to be a Templar, and I – I don’t hate you for it, and I shouldn’t have brought it up. And I’m sorry I shitted on your past like that, I mean it’s not….we’ve both been through shit and I’m never going to try to compare it again. I mean, after you told me all that I should never have…I shouldn’t have said a single word of it and I can’t undo it now and now -”

“If you want me to talk about myself more I’ll try. I promise. You can keep hating me, this is a terrible apology and I’m so sorry. I want to fix it.”

Sam swallowed.

“Alistair, your friendship means a lot to me and I should never have said those things and I am truly sorry.”

Sam stared at his feet. In the silence that followed, the glass lacerated him, nothing but pure agony. Sam didn’t move. He deserved it. _it’s not just your friendship that matters it’s more it’s more but it’ll never happen -_

“Sam.”

Alistair was looking at him. Sam fiddled with the cuffs of his robe.

“Yeah.”

“I accept your apology.”

“You do?”

“Yes, I mean we both said things we regret, right? And [joke].”

“I’ll try to talk more,” Sam said breathlessly.

“You don’t have to –“

“I will, though.”

“Okay.”

They sat in silence for a moment. Sam felt lightness in his chest as the bubble of guilt burst. Without realising it, he smiled. He sat down on the table and looked at the runes Alistair had been admiring. They were just runes. Not that interesting.

“So,” Alistair said, “What do you think of Denerim?”

Sam snorted. “It’s pretty shit. There are too many people, I got lost and some motherfucker stole my money.”

Alistair laughed.

“I don’t understand why people want to live in the city,” Sam continued. “It smells like shit all the time and it’s so fucking noisy and all the people are -

_sweetheart_

\- all the people are dicks.”

Sam looked away from Alistair again, kicked the table leg. _Why does everything always have to suck?_ The warm feeling was still there, protecting against the pain that was starting in his chest again. _Talk!_

“Alistair,” Sam said in a small voice. “When you first met me, did you think I was a girl?”

“No,” Alistair said in a puzzled voice. “Why would I?”

Sam swung his legs faster. “Err.”

_Did I not just promise to talk more? Fuck._

“A lot of people think I am. Especially at the tower, because humans are kinda stupid when it comes to gender and…y’know…”

He could tell by the look on the Alistair’s face that he didn’t know at all. Sam groaned. A memory, the knife in his hand cutting into his own chest, the hot bite and the cherry red of the blood surging out over his fingers…Sam waved his hands.

“Look, when you’re a human your parents decide if you’re a boy or a girl based on your body, right? Elves don’t do that. You get to choose it yourself, male or female or whatever. And I’m a boy but when they took me to the tower they decided I was a girl because of, ah, because of all the bullshit human gender crap. Do you get it now?”

“I think I do.”

“Okay. Good.”

They sat there for a while.

“But, um,” Alistair said, tentatively, “you don’t have…y’know…”

He made a motion over his chest like cupping a breast. Sam grimaced. He ran a hand over his own chest. His shirt covered the ridges of scar tissue, but he felt a stab of pain when he touched where he knew they were.

“No,” said Sam. “I don’t.”

“How….” Alistair must have seen something on Sam’s face because his voice trailed off and he had that sympathetic look in his eyes that Sam couldn’t bear to look at, because surely no-one could care that much, no fucking way. He felt like he was melting into a cold little puddle.

“I cut them off.”

There was no-one else in the shop apart from the shopkeeper, fussing with some artifacts by the door and definitely out of earshot, but Sam said the words in barely a whisper. He swallowed and continued, the words coming out in some kind of trance.

“They didn’t grow back. Lucky for me, I guess, because I don’t know what the fuck I would have done if they had. The Templars kept a close eye on me after that because they thought I was some kind of horrifying blood mage monster who was going to murder them in their beds. Actually, now that I think of it, that would have been a more productive use of all that blood than lying on the floor and screaming about it. But whatever.”

Sam let out a cold laugh. The knife felt like it was still cutting into him, or was it those stupid shards of glass that were supposed to be some kind of inner strength and now only cut him? Whatever. Alistair was silent. Very silent. _He hates me._ Sam didn’t look at him.

“Do you, ah….do you think less of me for this?”

“No! I think you’re brave.”

“ _Brave?”_ Sam said incredulously, and somehow he turned his head to Alistair because he had to know if he was joking. He wasn’t. _What the fuck? This isn’t brave. Brave isn’t…y’know…crying yourself to sleep every night because every little thing in your life is a pile of shit! Brave isn’t…I’m not fucking brave._

“Yes,” Alistair insisted. “You’re brave because you’re willing to go through great pain to stay true to yourself. It takes courage to do what you did.”

“Does it?”

“It honestly does. To do all that…it’s pretty badass.”

Sam snorted. “Badass?”

Alistair grinned. “Yep. Really badass.”

“Badass…” Sam tested the word in his mouth, rolled it around on his tongue. _Well, it’s better than pathetic._ “Okay.”

He looked at Alistair again. Felt that warmth again. Who knew that spitting out the pain inside him could actually make it go away, instead of tearing him apart as it came out. And it hadn’t hurt Alistair at all. Alistair still liked him. Sam marvelled.

“Thanks, Alistair. For listening.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did you notice what Sten was eating? It's a representation of how I feel about his character.


End file.
